counterstrike-banner
All News
article-headline
Hearthstone9 years agoRadoslav "Nydra" Kolev

Nihilum eliminate Team Liquid from ATLC, proceed to Satellite phase

After a nerve-wrecking 11-game series, Nihilum are still alive in the $250,000 tournament but not in the live finale just yet.

Team Nihilum started their ATLC campaign as one of the best teams in the tournament. By week three, they were the only undefeated roster and their next couple of games only slightly hampered their advance. By week five, they were on a 4-1 score, in prime position to make top two and from there – to the live finale.

Their final two series against Tempo Storm and Cloud 9, however, almost meant Nihilum’s end. Two losses in a row put them in a four-way tie-breaker with Archon, Tempo Storm and Forsenboys which is where their past performances came to cause them additional problems. As all of Nihilum’s wins were 6-4 or 6-5 while their last two losses were 3-6 and 2-6, respectively, the trio of Lifecoach, Rdu and ThijsNL ended up with the worst tiebreaker score, which meant going into the redemption match against Team Liquid. A loss there would eliminate them from the tournament.

Played last night, the redemption match started fantastically for Nihilum. Rdu and ThijsNL won the initial four games, putting Nihilum just two more wins away from moving on. With Lifecoach playing Hunter and Patron Warrior, the series looked set.

Although usually known for playing near flawlessly, this was suddenly a very rough series for Lifecoach. His Hunter lost three in a row and when the Patron Warrior also couldn’t deliver, the match was tied 4-4. The amount of mistakes in Lifecoach’s play was uncharacteristic for the current #1 player in Europe, leading to a lot of tension on the bench of Nihilum.

The series ultimately came down to a final eleventh game with Sjow on Mech Shaman against Lifecoach’s Patrons. Packing lots of damage across his weapons and burn spells, Sjow needed only to survive into the deep late game to apply all the pressure he had collected. He almost succeeded and it would’ve been a win for Liquid if Lifecoach didn’t find his double [card]Armorsmith[/card]s in time to get out of lethal range and turn the series around.

Archon, Tempo Storm, Nihilum and Forsenboys now ready themselves for the double elimination satellite bracket. The pairings will be determined by Archon – being the team to finish the highest out of the four – and the best two teams will advance to the live finale to join Value Town and Cloud 9.


More on 

  

All Esports

Entertainment

GosuBattles

Account