Paris, Guangzhou Surprise Everyone In Overwatch League’s Summer Showdown Tournament
Brackets were shattered and upsets reigned this past weekend during the Summer Showdown of the Overwatch League.
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Brackets were shattered and upsets reigned this past weekend during the Summer Showdown of the Overwatch League. The champions from the May Melee–the San Fransisco Shock in North America (NA), and the Shanghai Dragons in Asian Pacific (APAC)–were both dethroned, to the shock (heh) of everyone.
With the pandemic, the teams were unable to travel, so Overwatch League moved to an entirely online format. With this new format came the creation of monthly mini-tournaments: the May Melee, the Summer Showdown, and the Countdown Cup. The winners of each tournament receive not only money, but wins as well. These wins will help improve their overall season standings, so the better the teams do in the tournaments, the higher seeding they can get for the playoffs at the end of the season.
The May Melee was intriguing, with both the Shock and the Dragons solidifying their place at the top of their divisions; they continued to dominate through June, and everyone, analysts and fans alike, expected them to remain at the top.
The APAC region started out as expected; higher-seeded teams beat out their lower-seeded opponents, and the finals ended up being fought between #1 Shanghai, and #2 Guangzhou.
The series began the same way the May Melee finals did: Guangzhou went up 3-0 against Shanghai in a Best-to-4 series. In the May Melee, Shanghai were able to reverse sweep Seoul to take the championship, and their fans were hoping for the same here. However, to the shock of everyone watching, Shanghai were only able to secure two map wins before Guangzhou managed to take their fourth, securing themselves the championship.
Over in the NA region, everything was absolutely topsy-turvey. Three of the four knock out matches were surprising upsets, with lower-seeded teams surging strongly in the new meta that features Genji. The closest we had to a Cinderella story was #11 Toronto Defiant making it all the way up to the semifinals. But the Fusion swept past them, ending their story on their way to yet another tournament finals.
The Fusion had been expecting and had prepared to face against the Shock, but the Shock were upset in a tense and close series against the Paris Eternal, in one of the greatest matches in Overwatch League history. But it was just a precursor to the finals.
In the end, Paris took the series 4-3, denying the Fusion a championship yet again. The series was absolutely thrilling to watch, filled with insane insane clutch moments on both teams, and just overall good gameplay. These finals were peak Overwatch, and showed promise for intense and fun matches the rest of the season.
Sources: overwatchleague.com
Link Source : https://www.thegamer.com/paris-guangzhou-surprise-overwatch-league-summer-showdown-tournament/