Star players shine as M80 dominate the group stage
The VCL Americas Ascension tournament has proven to be an exciting tournament across all series with breakout performances from a few star players…at least when we can watch it. Countless tech pauses and massive delays have made watching the competition a heavily arduous task.
M80 came into the tournament as the team to watch for. With a history of being the runners-up at last year’s Ascension tournament and being the #1 North American seed, all eyes were on the proven roster coming into the event, and boy did they dominate. With a flawless 5-0 record and 10/3 map ratio, M80 have proven that they are the team that everyone should be watching. The team has also continued to innovate by removing their previously dominant Lotus comp and swapping in a brand new one with Yoru and Breach in place of Sage and Deadlock. Though their match record shows a dominant performance their scores in each map however, did not reflect that. Multiple overtime matches and less than 4 round differences were mostly across their victories. Despite these close scores, wins are in-fact wins, and it goes to show that M80 have the ability to close out these close maps. Can they close out the tournament?
All Knights has blown away all expectations of the roster with the unbelievable performances from Dantedeu5. Both he and the former Leviatan player, adverso, have put the Argentinians and Chilean on their back and brought them to a #2 seed finish in groups. An incredibly close 0-2 loss to M80 however, are leaving the team with a little more to be desired if they want a chance at claiming the Ascension trophy.
Galorys are continuing the conversation of breakout star players with lukxo. The Galorys controller player has put up numbers of an upper +15 K/D ratio. His start to the tournament was a bit too slow and patient, seemingly too careful with how lukxo elected to take his fights. But a slower, tentative start didn’t last long for the Brazilian player leading to some unreal performances especially as a player in the smokes role. Despite this, the team has experienced three losses in groups. The rest of the roster has to match lukxo’s level of dominance in order to move forward in the tournament.
2Game Esports has had a rougher go at the later half of the group stage after a 2-0 start beating TSM and RETA Esports. Their key players remain silentzz and spike with superb performances when they win but struggles when they lose. 2GE also lost out to their bigger brothers in Galorys which was a wonder of if they’d finally triumph over their Brazilian comrades. The team has to come into playoffs having barely skimmed through to the playoff stage on a 3 match loss streak, with fresh ideas and a better plan moving forward.
About The Writer
Hello all! My name’s Dante, otherwise known as “Dayeus.” I’m a young, aspiring journalist/content creator with a love for gaming and competition. I’ve been following Valorant’s esports scene since the game’s inception and hope to one day grow my knowledge and ability to inform to not just mine but yours, the reader’s, expectations. Please understand that my writing is a work in progress and I’ll keep looking to improve it. Thanks for reading!
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