While Day 1 of MLG Atlanta saw many of the top teams in competitive Call of Duty handle their business, Saturday's action saw multiple teams tumble from the top of the ranks. Here's how the action panned out during Day 2 of MLG Atlanta at the Georgia International Convention Center in Atlanta.
The rise of the warriors
There may not be a bigger surprise at MLG Atlanta than the meteoric rise of eUnited. After signing the former Gosu Crew roster that put together a scintillating performance at MLG Las Vegas, finishing in 9th-12th place, the team consisting of Preston "Prestinni" Sanderson, Pierce "Gunless" Hillman, Alec "Arcitys" Sanderson and Justin "SiLLy" Fargo-Palmer have not lost a single series throughout the first two days of competition. Often considered "online warriors" by the competitive CoD community thanks to their outstanding finishing in online events, but disappointing performances on LAN, the team led by Prestinni seems to finally be rounding into form.
And it's not as if eUnited have strung together an impressive win streak against inferior competition, either, having beaten 2016 Call of Duty World Champions Team EnVyUs in pool play 3-1, and then reverse-sweeping CoD Champs runners-up, Splyce, in the championship winners bracket. Should eUnited continue their dark horse run by upsetting FaZe Clan in the championship winners bracket semifinal match on Sunday, it may be officially time to remove the "online" and just stick to calling them warriors.
The fall of nations
Both Rise Nation and OpTic Gaming will enter Sunday's final day of competition in the lower bracket, as neither team managed to win their opening match in the winners side, losing 3-1 to Luminosity Gaming and Team EnVyUs respectively.
On the surface, both losses were defensible. OpTic Gaming, reminiscent of its opening round loss to Team EnVyUs at Call of Duty Champs 2016, couldn't deal with the relentless pressure from Team EnVyUs in the two Hardpoint matches of the series, losing a combined 500-293 in Rounds 1 and 4. Prior to that loss, OpTic had been looking stellar, winning every match in Group B. They simply ran into a hotter team. While a loser bracket run can be difficult, the Green Wall certainly have a shot to find themselves in the Grand Final if they channel the performance from Day 1, in which they put together a sparkling 3-0 record.
Rise Nation fell into a similar trap Saturday, facing off against their white-hot rivals Luminosity Gaming to kick off their championship bracket run. Save for a sound 6-2 stomping during Round 2 Search and Destroy, Rise Nation couldn't handle Luminosity's slaying power in the three respawn game modes, never really putting up much of a fight in any of the rounds. While Luminosity has been playing out of their mind at MLG Atlanta, Rise Nation's troubles can't be just chalked up to running into a hot team.
Many expected the MLG Las Vegas winners to put together a repeat performance at the latest North American LAN, but Rise has simply not looked like the same dominant team. While they did earn the second seed out of Group A, they still lost two of their four pool games and didn't look entirely dominant in their two wins either.
Crazier things have happened, but given their level of performance at MLG Atlanta, Rise Nation doesn't appear to be in the same form they were at Las Vegas, and that could lead to an exit sooner rather than later.