EPT
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This week, Zest declined to continue his streak of dominance in the cups, opening the way for
Solar to win in Korea and herO to shine in North America. On the other hand, Clem was not so merciful with his European opponents, and won the European cup for the third week in a row.Week #109 also featured the (brief) return of Nerchio in EU, and Clem suffering one of the top 10 upsets in history (by Aligulac rating) in the NA cup.
[ESL Open Cups are no longer awarding points for the EPT 2021/22 season. Cups will continue to be held and award prize money as before, but will only resume awarding points once the EPT 2022/23 season begins.]
KR cup: The Korean cup featured more even participation across the three factions than usual, with Creator, herO, MacSed and Nice as the notable Protoss representatives, Gumiho and SpeCial fighting for Terran, and ByuL, RagnaroK, and Solar competing on behalf of the swarm.
The absence of Zest gave players more chances to succeed, and SpeCial notably got to the semifinals by beating Chinese players Takanashi and MacSed by 2-0 scores. Creator had a strong run, defeating both Chance and RagnaroK 2-0 (the Zerg notably beat ByuL 2-0 to get into the quarterfinals) followed by a clean 3-0 sweep over SpeCial in the semifinals—an undefeated run with wins against all three races.
On the other side of the bracket, herO had a bye in RO16 and won versus Nice 2-0 to qualify for the semifinals, while Solar defeated HonMonO 2-0 and Prince on the same score to face the DPG Protoss in semi. This semifinals was as one-sided as the other one, with Solar beating herO with a convincing 3-0 to meet Creator in the finals.
Solar almost managed to win the cup without dropping any map, being up 2-0 versus Creator in the finals. The Protoss from Team NV won on Berlingrad to avoid getting shut out, but he was eventually beaten 3-1. Solar thus won the KR cup and tied Stats at 13 gold medals in the Asia/Korea region.
Upset(s) of the day: There were no significant upsets this week. The biggest surprise was Creator beating RagnaroK 2-0, but he was only an underdog by a small margin according to Aligulac.com.
*****
EU Cup: The European cup had a lot of participants as usual, but there was a particular name that we had not seen in a very long time. Polish Zerg Nerchio tried his luck in the bracket, after around 18 months without playing a single competitive match. Though he lost in the RO128 versus German Protoss ForJumy, perhaps he will participate more often in the future (he also resumed his anti-Protoss activities on the TL.net forums).
The top side of the bracket was once again dominated by Clem, although the French Terran dropped a map against underdog MilkiCow in the RO16. MaNa beat his former teammate Harstem (who is now with Shopify Rebellion) 2-1 to meet Clem in quarters, losing 0-2 in the PvT. A change in seeding meant ShoWTimE did not get to meet MaxPax this time (the two frequently met in quarterfinals to decide who would face Clem in the semi), and instead faced against much less scary Protosses: he beat Azura, ShaDoWn, and Krystianer 2-0 each. Unfortunately for ShoWTimE, he could not take a map off Clem in the semis, with the Frenchman looking in great TvP form ahead of Katowice.
The bottom side of the bracket was filled with Protosses, with six of them qualifying for the ro16 while Kas and HeroMarine faced off there as well, after respectively defeating trigger and arrogfire. HeroMarine beat Kas 2-0 as expected, and then defeated HellRaiser with a bit more difficulty 2-1 in the quarterfinals (the Protoss notably beat DIMAGA and Gerald). French Protosses PtitDrogo and DnS battled it out in ro16, with DnS coming out on top to challenge MaxPax in the quarterfinals (who notably beat BabyMarine 2-0 in the PvT and DisK 2-1 in the PvP), taking a game off the Danish Protoss before ultimately losing 1-2.
The semifinals between HeroMarine and MaxPax was a rematch of cup #104 finals, in which HeroMarine won 3-1, and this encounter was no different. Big Gabe almost swept MaxPax being up 2-0, but MaxPax managed to win on Berlingrad to avoid getting 3-0, although he lost the next map and thus the series 1-3.
The finals between Clem and HeroMarine is one of the most common finals through cup history, but it had been nearly two months since it last occurred in cup #99. While HeroMarnie was victorious back then, this time around Clem managed to ride his momentum to a third consecutive EU cup victory. HeroMarine opened up the series with a win on 2000 atmospheres, but Clem was ruthless and won the next 3 maps for a 3-1 series victory in the finals, to win his third EU cup in a row, for a total of 34 gold medals overall, still behind #2 HeroMarine (40) and #1 Zest (43).
Upset(s) of the day: This cup was not filled with many upsets, therefore MilkiCow taking a game off Clem in TvT takes the crown as the biggest upset for me this time, closely followed by Kas beating trigger 2-0, which is a mild upset even with slight server advantage.
*****
NA Cup: NA Cup #109 had a very amusing top four—nearly everyone got the same placing as the previous week, except this time herO won the cup instead of Zest. The Super Tournament champion declined to go for three consecutive wins in NA, giving his teammate herO a chance to take the gold for himself.
The bottom side of the bracket once again had MaxPax and Solar reaching the semifinals, with the Protoss defeating ForJumy and Krystianer 2-0 each among others to get there. Solar on the other hand beat amateur Korean terrans universe and jinioh as well as Gerald (who notably defeated Prince 2-1) without dropping a map. Unfortunately for the Zerg, MaxPax was still on fire that night and beat him even more convincingly than last time, with the 3-0 compared to the previous 3-1 victory.
The top side of the bracket featured a huge upset in the semifinals, with American Protoss Rob defeating Clem 2-0. Unfortunately, Rob's run ended in the quarterfinals, with herO taking a 2-0 victory. ByuN had a difficult quarterfinals opponent in Astrea, but he won their encounter 2-1 to face herO in the semifinals. Although the Terran was up 2-1 at one point, herO was clutch and fought back to win the series 3-2 and a shot at winning the cup with a last match versus MaxPax.
herO was once again put in the uncomfortable position of being down 1-2 in a bo5, but he proved to be fierce once more by clawing his way back and winning the PvP series against MaxPax 3-2, to win his fourth NA and sixth overall gold medal. With the win, he overtook Armani, Creator and Trap who are tied at 5.
Upset(s) of the day: the biggest upset was obviously Rob beating Clem 2-0, which is a tremendous upset as the protoss had around a 1% chance of defeating Clem in a BO3 according to aligulac. Unfortunately, I did not find any vod of the match so the mystery of how he made that happen remains, but the 1500+ rating differential makes it one of the top 10 biggest upsets (according to Aligulac) in SC2 history.
by Poopi
