ESL Open Week #141: herO, Clem, ByuN win

2022-23 ESL Pro Tour - Open Cups: Week #141 (September 18-19)

In week #141, herO won his first Korean cup since July (#132), Clem avenged last week's finals loss against HeroMarine in the European cup, and ByuN achieved another back-to-back victory in the Americas cup.

Korean Cup

There was a fierce line-up of competitors in the week's Korean cup, including Code S champions Dark, ByuN, Cure, GuMiho, Classic, and herO. If that was not enough, other solid contenders such as Astrea, Jieshi, TIME, and Cyan participated as well. Given the very strong field, there were high level matches as early as the RO16—a round that's often full of lopsided matches in other weeks.

Cure had a great run from the top side of the bracket, beating GuMiho (2-1), Dark (2-0), and ByuN (2-1) to reach the finals. On the opposite side, his DPG teammate herO reached the finals on the back of his PvP, beating Classic (2-1) and Astrea (2-0).

The finals (VOD) saw Cure win the first gamer on Stargazers, using a strong timing push around the 7 minutes mark. herO managed to get storm just in time to survive, but Cure still dealt enough damage to put him ahead for most of the game. Although it took another 8 minutes or so, Cure made herO GG out of game one.

After that though, herO did not give Cure any breathing room and won the three next games straight. A successful attack into defensive recall won him game two on Moondance while a big push with Colossus and Disruptors allowed him to win game three on Data-C. Finally, a very aggressive push with Stalker-Immortal-Archon let him close the series out on Tropical Sacrifice.

This victory put herO at 15 weekly cup wins overall, tying him at the 7th place spot with ShoWTimE. That's not bad for someone who's been in the military for a good portion of weekly cups' existence!

Upset(s) of the day: Cure winning vs Dark is a recurring, small upset in recent weeks, which is becoming slightly less surprising each time. Cure's combined run was probably the most impressive feat of the week, as he managed to beat GuMiho, ByuN, and Dark before falling to herO in the finals.

*****

European Cup

Zerg representation was thin yet again in Week #141, with only Elazer and Lambo competing among the DH: Europe main event players. The other factions had strong participation as usual, including familiar DreamHack main event faces like Spirit, SKillous, TIME, and ShoWTimE among others.

Rivals Clem and MaxPax faced each other for the second week in a row, this time in the quarterfinals. Clem managed to defeat his new found nemesis once more (MaxPax had beat him five times in a row recently, including some EPT cup finals), winning 2-1 to advance to the semifinals. Clem's semifinals opponent was Elazer, who had advanced on the back of strong ZvP wins over SKillous and ShoWTimE. However, ZvT wasn't quite as friendly to him, and he ceded the finals spot to Clem after a 0-2 loss.

On the other side of the bracket, the other top Zerg Lambo also managed to reach the semifinals, notably getting a 2-0 victory against TIME in the quarterfinals. However, he was also felled one step short of the finals, losing 1-2 to his countryman HeroMarine.

The finals between Clem and HeroMarine (VOD) was a rematch of the previous week's finals, where Big Gabe had won 3-2. This time though, Clem was the one who came out with the victory. He started by winning a 20+ minute macro game on Data-C—a very advantageous semi-basetrade at the 16-minute mark was the turning point. In game two on Tropical Sacrifice, Clem tried to play a weird mech style with a lot of Ravens and Hellions early on, but lost after his unsuccessful push left him far behind.

However, Clem went back to playing more standard styles in games three and four, which paid off as he won them both for the 3-1 victory. Clem thus tied Zest with 44 gold medals across all regions, and also narrowed the gap on HeroMarine who is still 1st place with 49 wins (all in the EU region).

Upset(s) of the day: There were no significant series upsets on the week. Kas taking a map off MaxPax was notable, while Elazer's run with victories over SKillous and ShoWTimE was an impressive feat on the whole.

*****

American Cup

MaxPax finally came back to the Americas cup after two week break, maybe unsatisfied with how things went while playing in Europe alone. Overall, the line-up was not very stacked, with the Danish Protoss, ByuN, Gerald, Nice, and trigger being the strongest participants.

Expectedly, all of these players managed to reach the round of 8 where they had to face and eliminate one another: Gerald beat trigger 2-1 before losing to ByuN in the semifinals, while MaxPax beat Nice 2-0 to get to the finals himself. This set up a finals match between ByuN and MaxPax (VOD), with neither having lost a map up to that point. It was also a rematch from Week #127, when MaxPax had won 3-2.

This time though, ByuN got a nice 2-0 lead in their BO5. He drew first blood on Waterfall, winning quickly with a Marine-SCV pushed assisted by 2 Vikings and 2 Tanks. MaxPax's Phoenixes and scrappy assortment of ground units weren't enough to dislodge this force, and he had to GG out against the push. The second game on Tropical Sacrifice was also a quick win for ByuN, who attacked even earlier with 2 Vikings, a Cyclone, and a few Marines. ByuN was able to trade well with this attack, and his reinforcements were enough to finish MaxPax off.

The Protoss wasn't one to give up an easy 0-3, however, and he won game three on Stargazers. This time it was a nearly 15-minute long macro game, where MaxPax took an economic lead and used AOE damage effective to defend his bases. With Templars in Prisms, Disruptors, AND Colossi, MaxPax traded efficiently over and over to snowball his advantage into a victory.

However, ByuN was able to finish the job on Data-C with another timing attack. This one came later and off of three bases, with mass bio supported by 4 Tanks. ByuN took up a perfect position behind the mineral line of MaxPax's fourth base, allowing him to massacre the Protoss forces that attempted to break the siege. MaxPax hung around for a few more minutes, but surrendered when it was obvious that ByuN's army could not be stopped.

Upset(s) of the day: Similar to Europe, the Americas cup went largely chalk. The closest thing to a perceived upset would be Gerald beating trigger as the Canadian Protoss was the slight favorite with more than 56% chances of winning according to Aligulac. However, that's not much of a margin in PvP, or high level StarCraft II in general.

by Poopi