The Rocket League Championship Series wrapped up it penultimate week of league play this weekend. NRG Esports and Renault Vitality are the first two teams to punch their ticket to the postseason LAN in New Jersey.
The weekend was ripe with upsets. Only one week of play remains, and week four’s action was a turning point for the season of most teams.
Two of the Big Three Fall in NA
Ghost Gaming kept their season alive with a 3-2 series win against Spacestation Gaming. Treyven “Lethamyr” Robitaille and Braxton “Allushin” Lagarec scored in game five to secure the victory. Allushin had perhaps his best series as a pro. He scored four goals and was all over the field for Ghost. Lethamyr also played well, scoring three goals and playing strong defense throughout.
G2 Esports hammered Splyce 3-0 in Saturday’s second series. The first game went into overtime, but overall G2’s pace of play was too much for Splyce. Jacob “JKnaps” Knapman scored five goals and notched two assists for G2.
Ghost preserved their hopes of making LAN with a 3-0 sweep of Rogue. Allushin was involved in all five of Ghost’s goals, scoring three and assisting on the other two. He earned player of the week for his performance. Each game in the series was decided by one goal, but Ghost’s defense was excellent. They started Saturday in last place, and finished the day in fifth.
Evil Geniuses ended Splyce’s season with a sweep in the fourth match of the day. Splyce are 1-6. 3-17 on the season and have been mathematically eliminated from postseason contention. The first two games went into overtime, but Gabriel “CorruptedG” Vallozzi scored in both overtimes to get the wins. Jamie “Karma” Bickford scored all four of Splyce’s goals in the series.
Spacestation pulled off a shocking 3-1 upset of Cloud9 in the fifth series of the day. Cloud9 had lost two games all season before dropping three to SSG. Alexandre “AxB” Bellemare scored five goals for Spacestation while Caden “Sypical” Pellegrin added three. Cloud9 were the first of NA’s Big Three to lose a series in Season 7.
NRG Esports qualified for LAN with a 3-1 victory over G2 Esports. They cemented their position in the top two behind a strong performance by Justin “JSTN” Morales. JSTN scored four goals in the series, including two to secure the series in game four after G2 took an early lead. NRG are the last team in NA and EU to remain undefeated.
Vitality and TSM Fall and Open Up Top Two
FC Barcelona began Sunday’s action with a 3-1 win versus mousesports. Yanis “Alpha54” Champenois scored nine goals (including five in game four) to lead Barcelona to the win. Mouz won the first game in the series, but Barcelona bounced back with a vengeance winning the next three by a combined score of 13-4.
Triple Trouble handed Vitality their first loss with a 3-1 win in the second series of the day. Vitality had been unstoppable over the first three weeks, but TT played with confidence and beat them in four games. Andy “Kassio” Landais and Aldin “Ronaky” Hodzic both scored three goals in the win. Triple Trouble played with admirable speed and teamwork to knock off the European giants.
PSG Esports then narrowly defeated mousesports 3-2. Three of the five games went to overtime and only one had a margin of two goals. Thibault “Chausette45” Grzesiak knocked in four goals in the series. Mouz played well behind Linus “alot” Mollergren’s four goals. Mouz missed an open net late in game four that would have given them the lead late, but could not capitalize.
Barcelona breezed past The Bricks 3-0 in the fourth series of the day. The Bricks struggled to generate offensive pressure and Barcelona had them pinned in their own half often. Barca outscored them 6-1 in the three games and held them scoreless for more than fourteen minutes across three games. The loss edges The Bricks ever closer to the bottom two, and gives Barcelona a chance to reach top two if they can beat Team SoloMid and Triple Trouble next week.
Triple Trouble picked up their second win of the day against Dignitas. The series went the distance, but Ronaky scored two goals in game five to seal the win. Dignitas played well in the loss, but couldn’t slow down Euan “Tadpole” Ingram who scored six goals in the series. Dignitas fall to 1-4 on the season, and have an important match against The Bricks (1-4) to determine their playoff chances next week.
PSG concluded Sunday’s action with an emphatic 3-1 win over TSM. Emil “Fruity” Moselund could not be stopped in the series as he scored seven goals and dished out six assists. PSG won the first game 6-0 and stole a victory in overtime of game two after after being down 2-0 with a minute to play. The loss dropped TSM all the way to fifth place, but they could still end up top two with efficient wins against The Bricks and Dignitas next week.
OCE and SAM reach home stretch
ICON Esports emerged victorious against Justice Esports. The 3-1 victory moves them to 4-0 along with the undefeated Chiefs Esports Club squad. Justice aren’t out of contention yet, as Chiefs have yet to face Justice or ICON in League Play. Out of Order and 1NE eSports both sit at 2-2 with eyes on qualification for the postseason.
There are four teams that sit at the top of South America. Erodium, INTZ eSports, Lotus and Lowkey Esports all have 4-1 records and have only lost to one another. Erodium kicked off Sunday’s action with a 3-2 win against INTZ, but lost later on in the day to Lowkey. Lotus picked up an easy victory against Orchid, and no other South American team has won more than one series yet.
All Week 5 action will be streamed on twitch.tv/rocketleague. Full standings, schedule and info are available on Liquipedia.
Featured image courtesy of DreamHack.
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