by Wax
Week #186 of the Open Cups took place under abnormal circumstances as sixteen top players were occupied with travel to Gamers8.
This led to a shocking result on the Korean server, as Danish Protoss

A historic three-server sweep seemed to be on the table for MaxPax after he won in Korea, but

The Americas server cup saw many players take advantage of the top contenders going missing, with players like BabyMarine, Lemon, Arrogfire, Mixu, and Silky all fighting their way into the top eight. However, the last man standing ended up being one of the few remaining powerhouses in

The non-ESL Korean Starleague was held on July 29th, and thus unaffected by travel to Gamers8. However, strong online players like ByuN, Cure, and herO have recently been skipping KSL, and Dark has benefited from being the strongest remaining regular. That proved to be the scenario in KSL #21 as well, with

ESL Open Korean Cup (partial bracket shown)
![[image loading]](/staff/Waxangel/EPT/OpenCup/week186KR.png)
*****
ESL Open European Cup (partial bracket shown)
![[image loading]](/staff/Waxangel/EPT/OpenCup/week186EU.png)
*****
ESL Open American Cup (partial bracket shown)
![[image loading]](/staff/Waxangel/EPT/OpenCup/week186NA.png)
*****
Korean StarCraft League #21 (Partial bracket shown)
![[image loading]](/staff/Waxangel/EPT/OpenCup/KSL21_2023.png)