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General12 years agoRadoslav "Nydra" Kolev

ViOlet sweeps IEM Sao Paulo

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Empire's zerg Dong Hwan "ViOlet" Kim stood triumphant at the IEM Global Challenge Sao Paulo grand final against oGsSupernova and was crowned the last GC champion for this season.

ViOlet, who did not have the easiest of times against Demuslim in the quarter-finals, defeated Ret 3-1 in the Ro4 and, finally, Supernova with the same score in the final match in a much more dominating fashion. Empire's zerg, who also had a very convincing performance during the group stage finishing first in pool C, is bringing home both a $6,500 prize check and a seed to the World Championship in Hannover this March.

Violet opened the series solidly, using his sim-city to defend Supernova's hellion opening, utilizing ling run-byes to constantly damage terran's mineral line (reaching more than 40 SCVs killed by the end of the match). Skipping muta tech altogether, Violet stayed on ling/infestor through the whole mid-game, using fungal growths and baneling land mines to tire down the marine count of every push of Supernova. By the 22th minute mark, Violet's impeccable play was paying hugely - he had +3/+3 for his ground forces and more ultras than Supernova had marines.

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On Antiga, Violet opened with a 2-base roach/ling timing attack, which was almost nullified by Supernova's hellion/banshee into quick third. Although not dealing any direct damage to the economy line of Supernova, Violet did in fact manage to delay the third CC and get his own expansion up by the time Supernova finally completed his. The terran tried to make something happen with medivac drops - a strat that worked so perfectly for him the days before - but Violet seemed to be everywhere. Choosing to go mutas this time, the zerg denied every move of Supernova to make the score 2-0, after his flock baited Supernova's marines into baneling, offensively burrowed inside the terran base.

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The only win for Supernova came on Shakuras after a couple marine/tank pushes from the low-ground brought down Violet's spawning pool and a medivac drop killed his third shortly. Violet was in big trouble - his third was too late and even all the ultralisks he spawned could not aid his cause.

In the final set, Violet took a similar approach as on Tal'Darim Altar, defending the hellion opening and using infestors to wane the marine presence in Supernova's pushes before finally overrunning him for the 3-1.

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Photo by: Team-Empire.tv

In the bronze final, the only foreigner in the top four Liquid`Ret dominated ReaL 3-0 in the first non-ZvZ he had to play at Sao Paulo.

IEM GC Sao Paulo standings

1. Korea Dong Hwan ViOlet Kim, $6.500
2. Korea Young Jin SuperNova Kim, $3.300
3. Netherlands Jos Ret de Kroon, $1.750
4. Korea Jin Sil ReaL Oh, $1.250
5-8. United Kingdom Benjamin DeMuslim Baker, $800
5-8. Germany Jonathan DarkForce Belke, $800
5-8. Belgium Jérémy Feast Vansnick, $800
5-8. Russia Artem SLivko Garavtsov, $800

If you missed any game from IEM Sao Paulo or want to analyze the more deeply, hop to our replay section and download anything you need.

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