EG to the Finals

Virtus Pro vs Mineski

The first match today was also the first elimination match of the tournament. The excitement started long before the game began as Mineski bravely took Dazzle + Huskar in the first phase of the draft. Virtus Pro however seemed to be prepared for this with an immediate Broodmother pick. They also busted out a fourth pick enigma, not a hero we see very often these days but midnight pulse does pure damage and it proved an effective counter to the Huskar. Mineski’s lanes couldn’t get enough of an early lead and a few bad fights later, in part due to a series of missed shallow graves, VP cruised to a very convincing win in 30 minutes. Game two saw a more stable draft from Mineski, with a last-pick Ursa in order to counter VP’s 2nd-last-pick Alchemist. Unfortunately, a crucial early misplay from Kuku allowed the alchemist to get a huge lead mid and he never really caught up. VP did an excellent job of negating spirit breaker rotations and gimping the Dark Seer, and the game snowballed from there into a brutal 21 minute GG. Mineski were the first team to be eliminated.

Digital Chaos vs EHOME

In the other losers bracket we saw DC go up against EHOME. Both teams had looked strong yesterday but ultimately fallen in close 3-game series, and neither of them were ready to go home yet. In game 1 both teams looked quite shaky, with the lead swinging back and forth on account of some questionable plays until DC finally took it with a better scaling team, despite Yawar’s Shadow Fiend finishing the game without a single kill. Game 2’s draft started very similarly, with EHOME prioritizing the Tusk pickup and DC securing Shadow Fiend + Bane. This time, however, EHOME opted for a very early Bounty Hunter pickup and made good use of it in the early game. No matter what DC tried, they never managed to trade well and with track gold adding up, EHOME were able to secure victory in under 22 minutes, a crushing contrast to game 1’s 42 minutes. In the deciding game, EHOME’s Alchemist pick triggered a huge fight at the bottom bounty rune, which DC won 4-2 thanks to their Undying. Even though Alchemist died just before the rune spawned, he still somehow managed to get the top bounty rune because DC ignored it after winning the fight for the bottom rune. Still, DC were well ahead and continued to draw ahead, though never by too much. 40 minutes in, with the game still within 10,000 net worth, a series of tense trades ended in DC going for rosh without buybacks. A disastrous fight in the pit pretty much ended the game as EHOME got 4 kills, the rosh, and simply walked down mid for the GG.

VG vs EG

Our last match of the day was the upper bracket finals between EG and VG. One of these teams was going to the grand finals, and one was going to the losers bracket. In game 1, an exceedingly greedy Anti Mage pick from VG was brutally punished by an absolutely breathtaking Queen of Pain performance from Sumail. Managing 15 kills in a 21-8 stomp, Sumail proved once again that he is one of the very top players in the entire game. In game 2, VG surprised everybody with a last pick Silencer for BurNIng. While the game was close for a long time, BurNIng slowly accumulated stolen intelligence and VG were able to close the game with their stronger teamfights. Like every other series this tournament not featuring Mineski, we were headed to a game 3. In game 3, EG faked out VG by putting the Tusk on support and last-picking a Broodmother that VG didn’t see coming. After 20 fairly even minutes, EG had pulled ahead slightly due to the farming speed of Alchemist and Broodmother. VG took a very poor fight at their Tier 2 tower middle, which cost them a lane of barracks, and as they tried to catch EG retreating they over extended and were wiped a second time in quick succession, ending the game and the series with another fast EG victory.

Bracket after Day 3