Quite an uneventful semifinals went by without upset (no Avalon sound the horns, hurray!) and we got the grand final we all wanted; Sea vs. Killer. The cream of the crop of SOSPA competition. The Jaedong vs. Flash. Probably the best final in SOSPA history, ever. To hype us up further the day starts with yet another ZvT between hero and Mong that should be a close and fair fight. You don't want to miss Friday's games.

We had another small break which is quite appreciated, it also allows more hype to be built up. KristofferAG has produced another batch of fresh recaps of the semifinals. New recruit kerpal provides us with a Battle Report of the intense opening TvT between Sea and Mong. Finishing is the preview of the finals to hype you up even further. Cancel the date, take a day off work, skip class, you don't want to miss this finals, it's on in .

Though JangBi returning to Brood War might be the biggest news of the week (month?), SRT wont stop no matter what. The semifinals were kicked off with a ZvZ between the heavily favored Minidong, Killer, and his opponent, hero. A TvT followed between three time SRT champion Sea looking for his fourth, and Mong, riding the roller-coaster back to the top after a tiny slump recently.

Killer opened with an overpool against the nine-pool of hero, with neither player trying to be aggressive with their first zerglings, instead going for their expansions and mutalisks. A small run by from hero was able to take out a few drones, while Killer's entire zergling army got caught out and killed off in hero's natural. Both players were left with a few mutalisks and scourge, and you really don't want to go into a mutalisk micro battle with Killer. hero got completely smacked down, as Killer took the lead.

The two players went for completely mirrored builds in game two, going for a later pool and an expansion before their spires came out. With a large surge of zerglings, hero decided to be the first to go on the offensive, but Killer's natural was defended nicely with a wall of zerglings, making him able to hold hero back until his mutalisks finished up. As Killer's mutalisks were out cleaning up overlords, hero grabbed a chance for a counter-attack, but was unable to do any damage before Killer made it back. It looked somewhat scary for Killer as the final attack came his way, with a large amount of scourge to back up hero's mutalisks, but with Killer's mutalisk micro there was little hero could do. On top of that, zerglings had taken out most of hero's workers in his main.



The third and possibly final game seemed to become a complete repeat of the second. Both players opened with delayed pools and went for their expansions. This time, however, hero attempted to break Killer early with a large zergling force. Somehow, Killer not only held, but came out on top, in spite of his ling count being lower. Thus begun round three of mutalisk vs. mutalisk. By now hero's figured out that a couple of scourge wont work against Killer, he'll just out-micro them. However, since Killer wasn't looking to go for the attack, hero figured that maybe, just maybe, a metric fuckton of scourge would work. Surprise surprise, it did! Killer had an inferior amount of scourge and mutalisks, and lost the final engagement, allowing hero to drag himself back in the fight.

Surprisingly enough, both players went for a twelve hatch in the fourth game, delaying pools and spires heavily. This is where Killer did what Killer does, with a sudden huge swell of zerglings catching hero completely off guard. Not only did he kill off all the lings of hero, and the natural expansion, but he also made it into his opponents main to kill all but three drones. Even with superior mutalisk micro there was no way hero could win, and after losing them, he did gg out, sending himself to the third place match.




I'm probably not being unfair when I say that the second match of the day, Sea vs. Mong, was the one people had been waiting for the most. The current number one on the ELO rankings against a Mong that seems to be in great shape. Then again, it is a TvT, so it could potentially be boring. Though with players like Mong and Sea, it's usually awesome. Read an in-depth battle report about game one here.

Possibly exhausted from game one, Mong went for a proxy barracks in game two, while Sea went for a CC first build before his barracks. You'd expect it to go really badly, but Sea was able to hold without losing much, before grabbing his natural and starting wraith and siege tank production. Mong tried to be aggressive while taking his own natural, but the wraiths shut it down. Sea soon got up a third while Mong teched up to wraith of his own, but Sea, already prepared, had a nice mix of goliaths into his army as well as turrets. An attempt to delay the fourth of Sea failed, Mong losing two wraiths to a single goliath in the process. Then came the big drop, which was able to kill of a large amount of SCVs, but nothing else. The follow-up drop was a disaster for Mong, as Sea was already prepared to defend. As all of his tanks died, Mong called it quits.



Sea could potentially secure his spot in the grand finals with this last game, and went for a slightly safer opening with a rax first. Sea attempted some dropship harass multiple times, but the defense from Mong was pretty much impenetrable. As they both were looking to expand, Sea pushed out and denied the third of Mong, dropping on his tank line to get a better position. Mong for some reason decided to take his entire army around the left side, possibly to attack an expansion that wasn't actually there, allowing Sea to push further up with his tank line. Then, his wraiths would go in to shoot at the tanks, while Sea sieged up right outside Mong's main base, getting vision with his wraiths, while dropping siege tanks into the main. It became too much for Mong to handle, and Sea was given the three to nothing victory.

The first game of a series is crucial and this game on New Heartbreak Ridge between Sea and Mong set the tone for the entire match between these TvT titans. Anyone following the scene will know that Sea has been on fantastic form and is looking to win a third consecutive SRT. The only people who would argue that Sea is not on the rise are those who say he's already at the top. Mong has been no slouch either, with a convincing win over Ample demonstrating his skill coming into this match.

Sea spawns in red at the nine o'clock position on New Heartbreak Ridge, with Mong across from him at the four o'clock in yellow. Both open with one-factory expands before adding starports. Mong chooses to build wraiths while Sea heads straight for a dropship. Vultures skirmish in the centre, and Sea comes out on top. Pulses rise as the vulture makes its way into Mong's natural, only too meet a single SCV who nonchalantly swats it with one blow of his fusion cutter.



Sea's dropship has finished and makes it's way to drop a pair of tanks behind Mong's natural. Landing his scouting barracks to block ground units from attacking while his tanks deny mining. Mong defends this easily, revealing his wraiths, and kills the dropship and both tanks while sending his first three tanks to Sea's third, at the seven o'clock. From there they are able to shell the gas.



Mong uses this pressure and adds a third CC, while still only on two factories, to take the two o'clock. He also attempts some wraith harrasment while Sea is clearing out his own third, but Sea has goliaths ready. Sea is on four factories with a high goliath count, and makes use of this with a counter push to Mong's third, denying the newly floated CC from mining.

Mong instead sends a CC to the five o'clock base, below his main, while setting up a tank line along the central ridges, hoping to make up for his later third by taking a positional advantage. Sea, however, shows some great game sense by sneaking a tank goliath force along the bottom edge of map, again denying Mong's third.



Mong finally clears his natural third of red tanks, and is on the back foot against Sea's effective aggression. Hoping to take control of the game he has been preparing dropships - and reveals them now by dropping six tanks into Sea's main, while holding the nearby ridge in support with tanks and mines. Sea is a step ahead once again; as Mong was building dropships Sea was massing wraiths from two starports, while beginning a fourth CC to send north, and a fifth in the corner beneath Mong's base. Although Sea takes some damage to the drop, Mong has been building vultures to support his tanks, rather than goliaths and is unable to continue the aggression against Sea's wraith switch.

The game settles there, Sea content to split the map diagonally and Mong unable to put on any pressure. Mong takes a fourth at the twelve o'clock mineral only, but is still behind economically. Crucially Sea has an extra gas at the five o'clock. Mong attempts to be aggressive along the northern path, but Sea has been taking advantage of his air control to switch from goliath tank to vulture tank and Mong is unable to make headway against the suicidal mine attacks from Sea. Instead he attempts a drop at the five o'clock which is handily defended by turrets, wraiths and SCVs.



Sea has secured the central expansion during this, while still having sufficient reinforcements available to counter a second wave dropped into the five. With Sea's tanks and wraiths focused on the center and down in that corner, Mong sees an opportunity to make some ground, massing his ground forces and pushing along the northern path. Unfortunately he is foiled yet again as he meets Sea's newly finished battlecruisers. He pulls back and masses goliaths then pushes from the north into Sea's central expansion, destroying it after a frenzied battle.



Sea's battlecruiser count keeps climbing, but Mong is now on an even footing economically, for perhaps the first time in the game, and makes devastating use of his mobility by dropping tank lines and storming Sea's natural with a massive goliath force. Sea surrenders his natural, which contained his starports, but destroys the eleven and twelve o'clock bases with the battlecruisers. Sea is now only mining from his third, at seven o'clock, and the pocket base at five o'clock. Mong is only mining from his almost depleted third but he is taking the resource rich central expansion.



A few of Sea's tanks kill some SCVs at Mong's third, forcing his army back and allowing Sea to move up to contest the center with battlecruisers and tanks. As Mong's last base mines out, he attempts a last ditch run past Sea's forces, but enough tanks are waiting by Sea's natural to delay the goliaths and Mong GGs as Sea traps him in between tanks and battlecruisers.



All in all a strong, intelligent game from Sea. Taking the initiative early and holding it with great decision making. Sea came out ahead in every tech switch, showing why he is deserving of number two on the power rank, and giving every indication that he is ready to challenge for the number one spot. Mong, to his credit, never looked helpless. He always had a plan and seemed aware of what he needed to do to take back control of the game. Sea's class showed particularly in his ability to anticipate and counter Mong's every move.

Both hero and Mong went out just like expected against titans Sea and Killer. hero made it to yet another semifinals but got eliminated just short of the grand final. It's the sixth time in a row now (SRT12, SSL8, SRT13, SRT14, SRT15, SRT16), it's a real testament to how solid and consistent hero actually is. But much like the KeSPA Sea he isn't anything more but that. He isn't the player that crushes everyone until he is the last man standing. No, there is always someone better than, always someone that beats him. Mong on the other hand is wildly inconsistent, with highest peaks of #1 ELO and winning one SSL, and two SRTs right after each other, followed by three Super Matches in a row. His valleys are even deeper, getting knocked out of the last three SRTs and the latest SSL in the early rounds, losing to much lesser players like Larva and Hi.



I think hero is definitely the better player of the two. But there is one thing in this match-up that swings the scales majorly. hero's worst match-up is ZvT by far, with under 42% win ratio. His recent wins against sSak made me hopeful, but alas I spoke too soon. On the flip side, Mong has amazing TvZ, his best match-up by far with over 66% win-rate. Mong has also shown that he isn't in one of his deepest valleys at the moment.

hero has time and again shown that he at least puts up a fight against the better Terrans, this should make the series somewhat close. I believe these players are quite evenly matched. But Mong should have the upper hand.

hero 2-3 Mong.



For the third time, Sea faces Killer in a tournament final. The match-up that has come to be the one to watch, very similar to the Jaedong - Flash rivalry. So far Sea has won both the encounters barely, after being down 1-2 in both series he has narrowly turned it around to two 3-2 victories. Outside of those finals they have met each other five times, Sea having the winning record of 4-1. The latest one was played this tournament in their round of 16 groups and Sea looked great, but so did Killer. All their matches seems to be so close, any little mistake swings it in favour of the other player.

Both Sea and Killer have set new all-time, and personal ELO records. They are on a level that SOSPA has never seen before. This match will not only decide who gets the gold, but also who gets to be called the #1 of the SOSPA scene. Sea has recently shown that he doesn't lack prowess in TvP anymore, and Killer can't afford yet another loss to Sea. If Sea wins he will also be the first to have won four SRT titles. Not to mention that it would be his third in a row.



Just as I said in the round of 16 preview, I can't tell you who wins this, because honestly I don't think anyone actually knows. Their matches are always way too close to say who is actually on top, and thus predicting is impossible. This final is probably the most anticipated one in SOSPA history. You can't miss this match, it's going to be remembered for a very long time.

Sea 3-2 Killer.