Genesis 4: Day Two Melee Singles Recap

Photo courtesy of vgbootcamp

Genesis 4 day two has come to a close. There are eight Melee players remaining and four doubles teams still eligible to take home the Genesis trophy. Day two had fantastic matches tied in with some upsets, but the trend in top 64 was finishing off players 3-0.

Plup Pulls the Upset of the Day
It’s not often William “Leffen” Hjelte gets beat 3-0 in a set. But Justin “Plup” McGrath did just that. He not only swept Leffen, he two stocked him in every single game of the set. Straight domination by Plup’s Sheik, who kept Leffen’s Fox in the corner. His edge guard conversion rate was high.

Plup will enter champion Sunday on winners side of top 8. He matches up against Jason “Mew2King” Zimmerman. The two are practice partners, but M2K has an overwhelming advantage in the set count. However, Leffen did qualify for top 8 by eliminating Daniel “ChuDat” Rodriguez.

Mango vs Armada Winners Semifinals
Genesis will get the famous rivalry between Joseph “Mango” Marquez and Adam “Armada” Lindgren, but not in the Grand Finals. Mango was questionably ranked in the fourth slot, setting up the matchup with Armada. Mango had a strong 7-3 record against Armada in 2016, but the match should come down to the wire.

The most likely scenario is winner of this set wins Genesis 4. Mango already sent Juan “Hungrybox” DeBiedma to losers bracket with a 3-1 victory. Each game was close, but Mango had counter-pick advantage. Hungrybox will face off with Jeff “Axe” Williamson, who’s having a good tournament.

S2J Thrills the NorCal Crowd
Easily the most intriguing set of day two was when Johnny “S2J” Kim sent the crowd into a ruckus and pushed Armada to the brink. Armada is rarely ever in that situation, so it was a key moment for S2J. His neutral game shined as he was landing long combos and evading attacks efficiently.

Unfortunately, his edge guards fell apart on game 5, as Armada got the reverse sweep. S2J eventually went on to get dismantled by Axe’s Pikachu to finish right outside the top 8. Even Armada looked shook at certain points against S2J.

Upset Results
Rishi “SmashG0d” Malhotra managed to take out James “Swedish Delight” Liu before top 64. SmashG0d went on to lose to Weston “Westballz” Dennis, who qualified for top 8 losers, but had another good performance at a major.

Swedish wasn’t the only top-15 player to fall to a lower seeded player. Mustafa “Ice” Ackakaya lost to Southern California Ice Climbers 3-0. Army did finish at his highest career placing, losing 3-0 to Joey “Lucky” Aldama. Lucky ended up winning six games in top 64 and finished one spot outside top 7.

Similarly to Hungrybox, Westball had some hand injury issues last week. His injury has not affected his game play, as Westballz has looked super strong. He qualified for top 8 by beating Zac “SFAT” Cordoni. It was a slaughtering, facilitated by the fact that SFAT wasn’t mentally prepared.

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