Last time Evil Geniuses and NP faced off was at NA BEAT Invitational last week in Montreal, Canada, where EE-Sama’s squad eliminated EG in the unforgiving best-of-one lower bracket format.
Today Evil Geniuses and NP fought each other for their Summit 6 survival, but this time around in a best-of-three format.
Game One
The opening game of the series featured a heavy team fight-oriented draft from NP who got a bit greedy with both Warlock and Tidehunter as their main actors for a win. At the same time they had a very strong early push with the Chen creeps and the Warlock ultimate. Although their tactic looked good on paper, Evil Geniuses' response came in the form of laning stage mind games. Starting off with Artour 'Arteezy' Babaev in the top lane on Timbersaw and Saahil 'UNiVeRsE' Arora on the offlane on Beastmaster, the boys in blue let Ludwig 'zai' Wåhlberg to skyrocket his Venomancer farm via Ancients and jungle.
Four minutes into the game Arteezy scored the first blood in the top lane, and EG tricked NP with a lane rotation immediately after. The Timbersaw was sent in the offlane, Venom rotated top and proved to be extremely disruptive and efficient soloing against NP’s Juggernaut, while Beastmaster took over the jungle to finish his Necronomicon. The entire map maneuver brought EG much faster level and item progression. EG was ready to brawl in the first team fight initiated by NP.
Forced to wait for their long ultimate cooldowns, NP had to go with tower trades. This strategy was also detrimental for them, and NP ultimately had to admit defeat only 19 minutes into the game when EG took down the first set of barracks.
Game Two
With one game advantage, EG went with a Pudge - Axe combo to secure a sort of dominance in the early game while having Arteezy on Morphling for the late game scenario. However, NP had a very strong start by hindering EG’s aggressive trilane and securing the first blood with both Witch Doctor and Ogre Magi just patiently waiting for the first Pudge Hook in the bottom lane. After the first blood was drawn only one minute into the game, Witch Doctor rotated top lane to ensure Kurtis 'Aui_2000' Ling’s farm. The overall laning stage went totally in NP’s favor. They were first team to take down a tier one tower while being extremely disruptive for Areezy in the bottom lane. A very early Necro for Arif 'MSS' Anwar’s Beastmaster and Boots of Travel for Jacky 'EternaLEnVy' Mao's Razor enabled NP to continuously push and hunt down EG's Morphling.
Despite being clearly in the lead, NP had a hard time when it came to the high ground push as Pudge's Hook, Warlock ultimate, and Axe initiation were a lot to deal with. Trading a bit too many lives for a tier three tower or just a melee barrack, NP allowed EG to slowly find the farm for their Morphling. The game went back and forth for the last 10 to 15 minutes, with each team looking to counter push and find the better kill trade.
Losing Envy, who didn't have buyback, during the mid lane high ground push, NP lost two lane of barracks immediately after and were looking to split push with their Beastmaster. Unfortunately for them, it was a little too late as Arteezy’s Morphling eventually got six-slotted and managed to secure the mega creeps on his own while his team was dealing with NP outside the Dire base. NP had dominated the majority of a tough 42 minute game, but it was Evil Geniuses who emerged victorious and will continue to fight for their survival at the Summit 6.
