Five-game sets. Stunning snipes. Favorites advancing. Underdogs winning. Day 3 of MLG Atlanta had it all, as eUnited managed to stave off a furious push by OpTic Gaming to win the championship on Sunday for its first major title of the 2017 season.
eUnited at last
Dubbed "online warriors" heading into MLG Atlanta, thanks to a litany of strong performances online but underwhelming finishes at LANs, eUnited might have officially shaken the moniker at Georgia International Convention Center.
Pool play wins over 2016 World Champions Team EnVyUs and CWL London champions Orbit were largely overshadowed by championship winners bracket wins over Splyce and FaZe Clan, as eUnited managed to survive not one, but two Game 5 battles to advance to the winners bracket final. From there, eUnited promptly swept Team EnVyUs to earn a Grand Final birth.
That's where the Cinderella run looked to be over, however, as eUnited was swept by OpTic Gaming in their opening series, which frankly never saw a very close round.
By virtue of coming through the winners bracket, however, eUnited still had one more chance to knock off OpTic Gaming. While most teams may have been demoralized from a previous series sweep, eUnited appeared to be re-energized, immediately taking the Game 1 Hardpoint win. The Green Wall would respond in turn, taking both Round 2 Search and Destroy and Round 3 Uplink to come within one round win of taking the championship. With the pressure mounting, eUnited took another Hardpoint win, this time in Round 4, to push the series into a deciding Game 5.
Having won their previous five Search and Destroy rounds spanning across four games, it appeared as if OpTic would have the advantage in the fateful final, but instead it was eUnited who would claim victory, riding a bit of momentum to take the final round 6-3. For eUnited and its relatively new roster, the win might go down as one of the most impactful in the organization's history, as the MLG Atlanta win, and the 25,000 Pro Points it awarded, puts them in prime position to secure a spot in the Call of Duty World League Stage 1.
A wall rebuilt
Although OpTic Gaming walked away with second place, its run through the lower bracket gave the tournament a positive vibe for the Green Wall and its fans. OpTic Gaming needed to win five straight games in order to make the Grand Final. Wins over eLevate and Pnda Gaming to start the run certainly came with nerve-wracking moments, including a Round 11 Search and Destroy victory to claim a series win over Pnda, but it was clear the Green Wall was rounding into form.
Still, matches against three of the best teams in competitive Call of Duty loomed large. The one with perhaps the biggest fanfare came first, as OpTic Gaming squared off against FaZe Clan, a team that has historically had OpTic's number for the better part of the past two years. Undeterred, OpTic took the series 3-1, winning the opening Hardpoint in dominating fashion 250-100 before closing out the series in a 250-241 Round 4 Hardpoint win.
Next was a heavyweight bout against Luminosity Gaming, which had lost just one series leading up to the match. Losses in Round 1 Hardpoint and Round 3 Uplink had the Green Wall down 2-1 in the best-of-five series, but OpTic responded with two straight wins to take the series 3-2. From there, OpTic would finish off its lower bracket run full-circle, demolishing a Team EnVyUs squad 3-0 that had knocked OpTic into the lower bracket to start the championship winners bracket.
Despite the loss to eUnited in the finals, the run through the competitive CoD gauntlet might have finally jump-started an OpTic team that hasn't looked like itself since dominating the competition for the better part of 2016. And that alone might make them the most dangerous team at the CWL Paris Open next week.