EPT
Zest, Patience and Dear as well as 
Forte, the underdog Terran.The first series got off to an unceremonious start. Forte survived Patience’s pylon rush, only to die to endless warp ins. Game 2 went quite a bit longer, but after a lot of posturing, Patience’s storm/colossus/disrupter army defeated Forte’s forces to take the game and match.
For the second match in a row, Cactus Valley played home to aggression. This time Zest’s one base attack stomped all over Dear’s more conservative robo/blink expand. The next game was the polar opposite. A wild few minutes of disrupter vs disrupter transitioned into Zest’s carriers against Dear’s tempests. The end result was the same, however, and Zest moved on to face Patience.
Zest started the winner’s match with the same sort attack with a proxy gate that killed Dear. After a solid start to his defense, Patience lost his natural. He then holed up in his main while pressuring with immortals and adepts. Losing on two fronts, Zest conceded. The roles were reversed in game 2. This time Patience went for a proxy gateway attack while Zest took an early expansion. Patience was able to kill it and once more the game stalled out into the midgame with Patience in the lead. After sniping Zest’s third, Patience caught his opponents in an awkward spot. Zest pulled his probes, but it wasn’t enough to prevent Patience from moving on to the round of 8.
In the loser’s match between Dear and Forte, Dear opened with an oracle in that gave him a 10 worker lead. Having taken his third, he widened his lead by switching to colossus. Despite losing a number of them in the middle of the map, Dear’s defense of a doom drop was stellar and his double robo production proved overwhelming. With Forte facing elimination, both players established themselves on two bases. Things fell apart from there, though, for the Terran. He did some damage with a mine drop, but was unable to defend against Dear’s adept pressure. A group a stalkers put the final nail in the coffin, setting up a rematch between Zest and Dear.
The second series between the two Starleague champions began on Newkirk Precinct. Zest opted to forgo an early expansion, instead delaying mining and killing workers with a pylon rush followed by oracles. Dear had an expansion, but he couldn’t mine and so Zest pulled ahead. When Zest marched across the map, he had more than twice Dear’s army supply. Gateway units supplemented by void rays and immortals were more than enough to take the first game. Both players opened passively in game 2. Only after starting his third, Dear moved out with his immortal/sentry/stalker army to attack Zest whose third base was already completed. When the two armies engaged, Zest was fighting up a ramp. Despite the disadvantage and Dear’s adepts killing his works, Zest’s superior immortal count and larger army squashed Dear. Suddenly at an irreversible disadvantage, Dear was easy picking for Zest, who killed off the last of Dear’s forces to become the second player to advance.
Patience and Zest advance to the quarterfinals.
