WTL 2023 Winter - Week 8 & 9 Recap - Plato Data Intelligence

Republished By Plato

Followers: 0

by: Nakajin and Wax

Weeks 8 and 9 brought the final regular season standings into much sharper focus, showing us where the key points of contention will be in the final two weeks.

ONSYDE Gaming became the prohibitive favorites to clinch the #1 seed after taking down both BASILISK and PSISTORM, moving 4 points clear of second place Shopify Rebellion. For ONSYDE to blow their lead, they would have to suffer major collapses versus both TL and Shopify—not impossible given the talent on those two squads, but definitely a long shot.

The more interesting scenarios to watch are further down in the table. In the race for the seventh and final playoff spot, Starlight Twinkle and Mystery Gaming are currently neck-and-neck. While SLT have a 2 point lead, MYG seem to have the upper hand due to their much easier schedule. Still, given MYG’s poor performances in the first half of the season, SLT can hope for another unforced error at a crucial juncture.

Down in the relegation zone, there’s a three-way race between Kwangdong Freecs, Platinum Heroes, and Matcherino to see who will be the second team relegated (SSLT are already a virtual lock). The Freecs hold the losing hand at the moment, but neither the Heroes nor Matcherino can let their guard down in the remaining matches.

Top 7 teams qualify for the playoffs.
Bottom 2 teams must requalify.
Points are awarded as follows:

3 points for a victory in a series that does not require an ace match
2 points for a victory in a series that requires an ace-match
1 point for a loss in a series that requires an ace-match
0 points for a loss in a series that does not require an ace match

Week 8 Recap

Platinum Heroes 2 – 4 Shopify Rebellion
Watch VOD: Part 1 – Part 2

Lambo dampened the Heroes’ hopes early, winning the first map against ace player Firefly. Protoss was never able to control the growth of the Zerg, and Firefly fell to a big 2/0/0 Zergling-Roach attack. Game 2 went much better for Firefly, with his early Oracle finding a decent amount of damage that set up a victorious Immortal-Sentry push.

With Lambo tying Firefly, PH needed to make a small miracle happen to find two more maps—starting with ShaDoWn taking on ByuN in a lopsided mismatch. On both maps, ByuN skyrocketed ahead on the back of his early game harassment. Game 1 was a pretty typical macro snowball win from ByuN, but Game 2 on Radhuset featured a much more stylish finish.

Goblin kept PH alive for a little bit longer, beating Scarlett with a skytoss Carrier rush build on Radhuset (helped by questionable scouting from Scarlett leading her to open with Mutas instead of Corruptors). Picking Equilibrium as the second map, Scarlett went for a gold base-powered Ling-Roach-Ravager all-in. However, Goblin came out massively ahead, killing 15 Drones with his early Oracle while only giving up his third base.

While hindsight is 20/20, I have to be critical of Goblin’s follow-up. He chose a passive skytoss follow-up, when it seemed like going for a big Robo-Gateway counterattack or taking the gold would have been a better option. As it played out, Scarlett had plenty of time to play catch-up, crank out mass Hydras, and punish an overconfident Mothership recall into her main. After that, Goblin played much better as the defender for around ten minutes, until Scarlett found her way into two entire Mineral lines with Zerglings to seal the deal.

ONSYDE Gaming 4 – 2 BASILISK
Watch VOD

The most anticipated match of the season started with Ryung and Reynor facing off in a rematch from their Summer season bout, and once again Ryung stole an invaluable 1-1 tie. Game 1 on Solaris started with Reynor’s Roach opening handling Ryung’s initial Banshee and drop harass without much trouble. Ryung transitioned into an 8-Rax bio-tank attack, hitting just as Reynor was getting his Hive online. Despite having a high army count, Reynor wasn’t able to reach any of the high-value Tanks due to Ryung’s good micro and excellent positioning. The situation looked promising for Ryung as he picked off a few outer expansions, but he couldn’t advance deep enough to deal serious damage. Having held the line, Reynor started his counterattack by sneaking some Lurkers out for a brilliant hold-position trap that ripped through Ryung’s retreating army. Reynor kept his gas on the pedal, attacking the impoverished Ryung with Hydra-Bane-Ling until the GG came.

Reynor then got out to a flying start on Oceanborn, using a handful of early Zerglings to shut down Ryung’s Hellion-Cyclone and even canceling Stim research on an exposed Tech Lab. That allowed Reynor to quickly go up to 80 Drones and four bases, while Ryung prepared for a 3-base all-in with 2/2 infantry supported by Mines and Hellbats. Despite his strong economy, Reynor found himself lacking Larva at the worst possible time as he floated a decent amount of resources when Ryung came knocking. This, combined with great micro from Ryung, meant Reynor just couldn’t get the swarming engagement to decisively beat back the Terran bio. Ryung was able to keep fighting small/mid-size chunks of the Zerg force and take great trades, and eventually his parade push marched to victory.

Solar was the big favorite going up against Trigger, but he didn’t shy away from taking a calculated risk to start. He went for a gold base rush on Alcyone, which led to an unstoppable Roach-Ravager attack after the expansion went unimpeded. Trigger had his own gold base trick in mind for the second game, going for a one-base proxy-Tempest Cannon-rush on Radhuset. All the buildings were proxied at the enemy gold base, and even a Nexus was eventually placed there. While this cute, Has-like build did manage to kill the Zerg natural, Trigger didn’t actually end up with a better economy as Solar quickly made a replacement Hatchery and established himself on three bases (it didn’t help that Trigger’s misplaced buildings at the gold base completely blocked mining on two Mineral patches). Trigger still might have pulled off some magic against Solar’s mass Corruptor-Roach with some excellent micro, but instead he got enveloped by the Zerg forces when he moved slightly out of position.

Serral and Maru came on last, and to the surprise of cynical StarCraft 2 fans everywhere, they actually delivered an amazing series. You’ve probably seen this match by this point—after all, it was one of the best series of November and talked about all throughout the community—so we’ll dispense with a detailed recap. It will suffice to say that the two players engaged in highly entertaining macro games, and looked very much like equals as they arrived at a 1-1 draw.

This ended BASILISK’s regular season winning streak of 18 matches without a loss, and put ONSYDE in pole position in the race for 1st place (they’d capitalize on the opportunity in Week 9).

Matcherino Esports 2 – 4 Starlight Twinkle
Watch VOD

The soon-to-be American champion Astrea struck first, winning game 1 against Nice with a handful of Blink Stalkers. The second game was a bit crazier—Nice opened with Oracles and killed 13 Probes while Astrea went on the offensive with a two-base Immortal + Gateway units army. In the end, Astrea’s ground attack more than made up for the Probe damage he took, and he gained enough of a lead to win in a macro game.

NightMare was in a great position to bring Matcherino victory, but he sadly got Cham’d like so many others before him. In the first game, it was a slightly misplaced warp-in that did him in, as Zerglings and Banelings slipped past a warping Stalker to deal fatal damage. In the second game, it was the trademark deluge of Lings and Roaches that surprised NightMare. He tried to pull off a fancy defense with high-speed Colossus juggling and Blink micro, but Cham countered by simply shoving more units down his throat.

Tied at 2-2, everything was still up in the air, and that’s when we learned Arrogfire simply didn’t show up. Thus, it was a forfeit, and Wayne took the 2-0 for free. While Wayne was the favorite to take the sweep in a regular match, it was still a very a disappointing end to what could have been a dramatic chapter in the playoff race.

Mystery Gaming 4 – 2 PSISTORM Gaming
Watch VOD (Chinese)

Mystery Gaming started on rough footing, with SHIN giving up a 1-1 tie to Spirit in a match where they really needed a 2-0. SHIN won the first game with solid macro play, controlling the mid-game with Roach-Ravager before adding Ultras and Vipers to seal the deal. However, Spirit hit back in game 2, overpowering SHIN with a committed three-base push.

Next up for Mystery was Bunny, who managed to fight PSISTORM ace MaxPax to a standstill. Game 1 gave us the familiar opener battle of Mine-drop vs Blink-Stalkers, and MaxPax came out decently ahead in terms of damage dealt. Bunny had a chance to turn the game back in his favor with a Marine-Tank attack, but MaxPax easily crushed the attack after the sight-blockers on Hecate allowed him to hit a perfect flank (kind of on accident). Bunny got a point back in game 2, executing a two-base Raven push to near perfection.

The result of the match was left in the hands of each team’s third wheels, Strange and Gerald. Game 1 on Hard Lead saw the try-hard Gerald attempt a proxy-Stargate in the corner of the map while Strange tried even harder by proxying a Pylon in the corner of Gerald’s main. Even pros fall for Gold league strategies sometimes, and Gerald had to GG out to Adepts warped into his main followed by an Immortal push.

Strange continued the all-out aggression on Radhuset, going for a 4-Gate Blink Stalker all-in. Gerald had no trouble holding off the attack, buying time for Immortals while also sending Oracles across the map to raid the enemy Probe line. Strange had taken a faster natural while he had Gerald contained, but it was of little solace as he had no direct counter for the impending counterattack of Stalkers and Immortals. Recognizing the danger, Strange preemptively started breaking down the backdoor rocks of Gerald’s base. Strange’s speed and decisiveness made all the difference, as his Stalkers entered Gerald’s empty base while Gerald’s forces were still in transit. The ensuing basetrade was rather one-sided, and Strange devastated Gerald’s economy while taking acceptable losses at home. With Gerald left on almost a 0-base economy, Strange easily took the win from there.

Team Liquid 5 – 1 Kwangdong Freecs
Watch VOD

One needed to be truly a die-hard WTL fan to tune into the broadcast on championship Sunday of the EPT Regionals, as it featured two rather one-sided matches in TL vs Freecs and SSLT vs DKZ.

We got the best series of the day right at the start, as Stats and SKillous tied 1-1 in a fun, if somewhat messy, Gateway-centric series. After a hectic start to the second game, Stats would get the only points of the Freecs for the day with DT walking into the base of a detection-less SKillous.

The first game of Cure-TY was also pretty close and fun, with the Cure going for Cyclone shenanigans and defending a two-base push with mass Cyclone-Raven. Cure continued the fun with a mech-build in game 2, but sadly, he kind of accidentally won the game with 2 Reapers. Mind you, it wasn’t ‘’proxy-Reaper’’ or ‘’two Reapers and a couple of Hellions.’ No, he just went Reaper-expand, rallied his two Reapers across the map, and killed like 10 SCV’s before rolling over TY. Overall, it was a rather depressing indicator of TY’s current skill level.

Clem and Keen didn’t give us many more thrills. Clem controlled game 1 on the back of a crippling double Cyclone drop harass before winning the second game in under 5 minutes with a two-rax proxy-Reaper rush.

瘦死骆驼 (Starving Camels) 1 – 5 Dragon KaiZi Gaming
Watch VOD

The Starving Camels and DKZ match was almost a repeat of the prior TL vs Freecs clash.
Cyan and herO played a pretty close, if somewhat unremarkable, PvP series that ended in a draw. It was yet another good showing for the Chinese Protoss who has been the lone bright spot for SSLT this season.

Dark dominated Silky to bring DKZ to 3 maps, although Silky was able to hang around for a bit in the second game. For good measure, Oliveira extended his 6-years invincibility streak against TooDming with a 2-0 to confirm the victory for DKZ.

Match of the Week: Serral vs Maru

Watch VOD

If you haven’t seen this already, then what are you waiting for? We’re linking the version from Cranky Ducklings (who provide incredibly consistent coverage of WTL for the English-language scene), but chances are your favorite YouTuber has also uploaded their own cast of the match by this point.

Week 8 MVP: MYG.Strange

Strange claimed the Week 8 MVP award for scoring a huge 2-0 upset against Gerald that kept MYG’s playoff dreams alive. Solar and ByuN also received consideration for their 2-0’s of Trigger and ShaDoWn, but considering the circumstances, Strange’s win definitely felt like it was more “valuable.”

Week 9 Recap

Starlight Twinkle 4 – 3 Kwangdong Freecs
Watch VOD

KeeN got off to a poor start in game one against Wayne, with both his Reaper and Hellion harassment getting shut down by Speedlings. However, the game completely changed when he got Marines and Medivacs on the field, which he used to take great skirmishes all around the map. That allowed KeeN to jump ahead to a big mid-game lead, which he snowballed to a victory using a Bio + Liberator composition.

Game two on Equilibrium had a different tenor, with both players taking a more passive approach as they prepared for a late-game battle. KeeN played the turtle-Terran style quite well for a while, holding off several waves of Ultralisk-based attacks. However, he mismicroed his Thors during Wayne’s Brood Lord switch, giving the Zerg an opening to end the game.

soO broke the deadlock with a 2-0 over Cham. The Freecs Zerg took game one on the back of his Roach-Hydralisk army, which countered Cham’s ‘surprise’ Mutalisk switch in the mid-game. Game two saw the two Zergs engage in almost non-stop early-game combat between Roaches and Zerglings, with the amusing twist of both sides omitting Baneling production. The game turned when soO caught a chunk of Cham’s Ravager-Ling force out of formation, prompting a rather hasty GG from Cham.

With his team on the verge of defeat, Nice forced the ace match with a clutch 2-0 over TY. Nice took game one in a straight-forward macro game on Equilibrium, with TY continuing to look a ways off from his pre-retirement form. With game two taking place on the defense-friendly Radhuset station, TY went for mech in an attempt to throw Nice off. Instead of turtling forever, TY hit a max-out timing with Tanks and Cyclones. However, TY’s army composition was too low on Hellions/Hellbats, allowing Nice to smash it with Zealots and take the game.

Nice took on ace match duties for SLT, while the burden fell on KeeN for the Freecs. Neither player had any tricks prepared, with Nice opening with defensive Blink into Colossus while KeeN went for a 2/1/1-style start. The game swung in Nice’s favor pretty early on, as he completely shut down KeeN’s initial Infantry + Medivac harassment (including picking off a full Medivac). From there, Nice got the macro snowball rolling, although KeeN wasn’t so far behind that it was unplayable. However, KeeN got blindsided by a surprise Purification Nova in a key fight, and had to GG not long after.

Platinum Heroes 1 – 5 Mystery Gaming
Watch VOD

Bunny led MYG’s charge to the playoffs with a 2-0 over ShaDoWn in the first series. Bunny took the initiative early in game one, killing plenty of Probes with his 2-Banshee harass (aided by some iffy Observer micro from ShaDoWn). A follow-up Raven push destroyed ShaDoWn’s third base, giving Bunny an insurmountable lead. Bunny went for more early harass in game two, this time in the form of Mine drops with Drilling Claws and an Armory. While ShaDoWn parried the first drop, he couldn’t stay on top of the follow-up drops and took game-ending Probe damage.

SHIN proceeded to clinch the three points for MYG, taking his own 2-0 over Firefly. Game one was one of the stranger PvZ’s we’ve seen in the WTL, with Firefly porting his PvT style over to PvZ and going for mass Gateway units with double-Forge upgrades. While Firefly couldn’t finish SHIN with his 2/2 vs 1/0/0 timing, he did succeed at pinning SHIN back while taking mass expansions for himself. The situation got better for RagnaroK when he got Lurkers out on the field, but the highly mobile Protoss army continued to harass from all directions and restrict his movements. In the end, SHIN was able to force the head-on fight he wanted, and he ripped through the mostly Gateway unit force to take the game.

Game two followed a similar pattern, with Firefly again playing a mass Gateway unit style with double-Forge. SHIN learned from the previous series and showed a better feel for how many troops he needed to handle the unusual composition. Firefly adjusted as well, making a far quicker transition into Disruptors. Unfortunately for Firefly, he had trouble splitting his forces properly on defense, and SHIN picked him apart with two-prong tactics using his Hydra-Lurker force.

The last match wasn’t entirely meaningless for MYG, with a map-score tiebreaker with SLT starting to look like a realistic scenario. Game one on Equilibrium saw Strange open with 3-Gate aggression (one Gate proxied), while Goblin went for 2-Gate into Oracle play. In one of the funnier WTL moments of the week, Strange decided to ‘contain’ Goblin and take his natural, while Goblin simply took a hidden gold base just a screen away from Strange’s proxy Gate. I’d like to say Goblin snowballed his gold base advantage to victory, but ‘rollercoastering’ to victory would be more appropriate here. After a few minutes of chaos, Goblin did manage to get the win. Strange got a point back in game two, defeating Goblin’s 2-gate expansion with a 4-Gate Blink all-in off of one base.

Team Liquid 2 – 4 Dragon KaiZi Gaming
Watch VOD

Game one between Cure and Dark started at a slow pace, with the action only picking up when Cure launched his first major attack with 2/2 infantry and Tanks. Dark dealt with the attack beautifully, sending Zerglings to counterattack while ambushing the Terran forces with Roach-Ravager-Bane from the cover of the sight-blockers on Oceanborn. Cure had just enough gas left in the tank for one more maxout attack, but Dark crushed his force as well with his great spellcaster use.

Cure decided to put on the pressure earlier in game two, committing to a quick push with his first two Tanks. However, Dark simply ceded the base being sieged, while countering with a peculiar combination of Mutalisks and Zergling drops. The Mutalisks then returned to help clean up the encroaching Terran force, putting Dark ahead with a big lead. Cure’s turtle play allowed him to save up for a final maxout attack, but Dark swarmed over it with waves of Muta-Ling-Bane.

Clem and Oliveira had the same idea in their first game, with both players going for heavy Cyclone and Raven production early on. A skirmish between the mirroring forces was a wash in terms of supply, but ultimately a huge win for Clem as he killed all three of Oliveira’s Ravens while preserving his own. This advantage for Clem didn’t matter as much as one would expect—the game was actually decided on Oliveira’s disastrous Marine charge into a position where Clem had several Tanks. However, the Ravens did aid Clem’s game-ending push after he won that battle.

The following clash on Site Delta was the best game of the week, as the two Terrans engaged in one of those bloody, back-and-forth, Marine-Tank wars that make TvT so great. Oliveira took on the “ByuN” role here, eschewing higher tech in favor of pure Marine-Medivac-Tank. On the other hand, Clem rolled with a higher quality force, adding Viking and Liberators into his mix. In the end, Oliveira was able to use his mobility to secure a slight expansion advantage, which made all the difference in the frenzied basetrade sequence that ended the game.

herO proceeded to lock in three points for DKZ with a 1-1 against SKillous. Adept run-by’s were the key to herO’s victory in game one. A moment of inattentiveness from SKillous allowed herO to get two early Adepts into the enemy main, and from there, herO continued to harangue SKillous with pesky shades. SKillous couldn’t capitalize on herO’s many sacrificed Adepts with his Blink-Stalker counterattack and eventually GG’d out. SKillous did manage to get one map for the road, with his one-base Stalker-Prism all-in busting herO’s fast expansion.

ONSYDE Gaming 4 – 2 PSISTORM Gaming
Watch VOD (Chinese)

Game one saw the two Terrans take different approaches to the pre-stim window, with Maru focusing on Cyclones and Ravens while Spirit went heavy on Tanks. Maru’s composition proved to be stronger in this game, with Ravens locking down the enemy Tanks and giving Maru a resounding victory in an early battle. Maru wasn’t able to end the game directly, but had no trouble living up to his reputation as a TvT master and snowballing to victory off his early lead.

Week 9 turned out to be a great week for fun TvT’s, as Maru and Spirit also delivered a very entertaining bout in their second meeting. Spirit’s fantastic drop play really put the hurt on Maru in the mid-game, forcing the ONSYDE ace into survival mode. However, falling into a 6000+ bank disadvantage only served to activate old-school Maru, who clawed his way back into the game with his signature mass Ravens and defensive play. Spirit kept things close with his mass Viking-Liberator composition, but he just couldn’t keep up with Maru’s late-game movements in the end.

Unfortunately for MindelVK, his season debut ended in the expected 0-2 loss to Solar. Game one saw MindelVK try to take on Solar in a straight-up game, but he fell apart when surprise Mutalisks showed up in his mineral lines. MindelVK opted for a bit of deception in game two, opening Void Ray-Oracle to set up a mass Chargelot all-in. Solar was taken by surprise, but he stalled for just long enough with his Queens to crank out the units needed to survive and win the game.

While the series was already lost for PSISTORM, MaxPax managed to salvage some map points with a 2-0 against Ryung (which may come in handy in a tiebreaker against Liquid). MaxPax got away with a fast gold base on Equilibrium, after which he overran Ryung with lots and lots of units. Ryung went for a 2-Factory Cyclone cheese in game two, and got lucky as MaxPax’s scouting units barely missed his proxied buildings. MaxPax still managed to barely hold at the cost of 27 Probes, and Ryung gave the GG as he had been completely all-in.

Matcherino Esports 5 – 1 瘦死骆驼 (Starving Camels)
Watch VOD

Game one of NightMare vs TooDming started with the Protoss applying some Glaive-Adept pressure off of three bases and getting a surprising amount of damage done. While NightMare didn’t kill any Drones, he picked off some units and a handful of key buildings—including a Roach Warren researching speed. The follow-up Blink Stalker was too much for TooDming to handle and he surrendered the GG.

With TooDming picking Radhuset Station for game two, NightMare pulled out an unorthodox strategy in the form of a two-base Tempest rush. TooDming decided to go for a Ling-Bane counter after getting caught off-guard by the Tempests, and nearly did enough damage to even things out. However, NightMare managed to hold at home thanks to Battery Overcharge, and his Tempests forced another GG out of TooDming.

Astrea vs Cyan began with an exhilarating PvP on Hecate, which was played on such a knife’s edge that it didn’t get past the Blink-Stalker phase for over twenty minutes. After 27-minutes of near-constant fighting, Astrea eventually won out due to his slightly better control over the key expansions.

Game two featured a very quirky opening sequence, with Astrea going for a proxy 2-Gate while Cyan opened Forge fast expansion after scouting Astrea’s empty main. However, Cyan’s expansion wasn’t even all that fast, as Astrea mind-gamed Cyan by taking an even faster Nexus while Cyan was spending money on a Forge and Cannon. Things shortly got even worse for Cyan, as a pair of Adepts slipped into his base to wreak havoc. On the other hand, Cyan’s sneaky hidden Dark Shrine and DT’s failed to inflict much damage at all. Astrea played with a major advantage from there on out, and proceeded to win the game with a weird but effective Colossus-Adept attack.

With Matcherino already having the three points in hand, Silky and Future concluded the contest with a 1-1 draw. The two players traded blows in fairly standard macro games, with Future winning on Equilibrium while Silky took Goldenaura.

Shopify Rebellion 3 – 4 BASILISK
Watch VOD

The opening match of ByuN vs Trigger started with the familiar Mine-drop vs 4-Gate Blink scenario, with Trigger coming out far ahead thanks to his decisive Blink moves. In fact, Trigger played the scenario so well he didn’t need to make a mid-game transition—he ended the game directly with Stalkers.

ByuN seemed to consider going for Mine drops again in game two, but pivoted into more defensive play after scouting his opponent’s Phoenix opener. Once ByuN had Stimpak and Medivacs, he decided it was time to strike. Seeing Trigger’s Phoenixes lingering around his Barracks to pick off units, ByuN sneakily sent off a detachment of Medivacs to drop the Protoss expansions. Trigger took a considerable amount of damage from these attacks, setting ByuN up beautifully for the mid-game. ByuN stuck to his aggressive ways and delivered a stylish finish, whittling Trigger down with constant strikes.

Lambo vs Reynor began with a Roach-Ravager war on Hecate, which ended up being the type that’s decided by the first big fight. This time, it was Lambo who had the slight numerical and positional advantage needed to carry the day.

With Reynor picking Equilibrium as the second map, Lambo executed what seemed like a very precisely calibrated all-in: Gas-Pool-Hatch (at the gold base) with just three Drones transferred to mine Minerals at the gold. This led into a 17-Drone Ling-Bane all-in, which posed a serious threat to Reynor and his 3-Hatch start. Reynor’s defensive micro was superb, but it only delayed his demise at the hands of the clever all-in.

It fell upon Serral to yet again save the day for BASILISK, and he answered the call with a 2-0 over Harstem. Game one Equilibrium seemed like it was headed to a passive macro build-up with both players taking their gold bases quickly, but Serral quickly took the upper hand with a backdoor Baneling attack that took out several Probes at Harstem’s gold base. Despite the setback, Harstem trudged forward with his plan to rush up to Carriers, and he did a remarkably good job holding off Serral’s Ling-Roach-Bane aggression while his Carrier was low. However, surviving is an entirely different thing from winning, and eventually Serral beat Harstem to death with his giant bag of money.

Harstem picked Radhuset Station as the second map and decided to give the trendy Tempest rush a whirl. Harstem’s variant was less all-in than some others we’ve seen on the map, only producing Tempests out of a single Stargate while building up a regular ground army behind it. The Tempests were easily stalled by Serral’s Spores and Queens, but Harstem had a second phase prepared for his strategy—establishing a proxy position at Serral’s gold base with the help of Blink Stalkers. Unfortunately, we didn’t really get to see how this would play out, as Mutalisks swooped in from out of nowhere to ravage Harstem’s mineral lines. Harstem just didn’t have the troops needed to defend at home and continue to pressure at the front, and he GG’d out after taking massive Probe damage.

With Lambo already having pulled off a big ZvZ upset on the day, he took on the task of facing Serral in the ace match. The two players opted for fairly conventional 3-Hatch starts on Goldenaura, but their paths quickly diverged. While Lambo continued to tech up to Spire tech, Serral remained on tier-1 tech and went for a big Roach-Baneling attack off of 38 Drones. The attack caught Lambo flat-footed, and dealt serious damage even with Serral Droning up heavily instead of sending reinforcements. Lambo survived for long enough to get Mutalisks out, but the game was already far out of reach at that point. After poking around Serral’s territory with Mutas and assessing the hopeless situation, Lambo GG’d out.

Match of the Week: Clem vs Oliveira – Game Two

Watch VOD

A close, action-packed TvT between top players is one of the most delightful things to watch in pro-SC2, and Clem and Oliveira gave us such a gift in Week 9.

As it turns out, Week 9 was pretty loaded with entertaining games, as Astrea vs Cyan and Maru vs Spirit were also well worth watching.

Week 9 MVP: BASILISK Serral

Both Serral and Nice came up with fantastic ace performances on the week, dragging their teams to victory by going 3-0. However, Serral gets the nod for our weekly MVP award due to the superior strength of his opponents, as he beat Harstem and Lambo compared to TY and KeeN for Nice (imagine saying this 3 years ago).

Weekly MVP’s: