The Biggest Upset in the Overwatch League Yet
Yesterday the Fusion did what many thought impossible, they knocked New York out of the playoffs. The Fusion had already taken the first match in the series against the Excelsior on Wednesday. That day the game ended in a dominant 3-0 victory for Philadelphia with the key to their success being their defense. Having been handed this embarrassing loss by the lowest ranked team to make the playoffs the NYXL had two days to figure out what went wrong. Everyone expected a strong return from the all Korean roster. Everyone expected two matches. Some people hoped for a Philly win, but aside from fans the expectation was that New York would advance.
This was was a very reasonable expectation. New York had, after all been a dominant team. They had in fact been THE dominant team. They had the best regular season record of any team in the league long before the season had actually ended. They appeared in every single Stage Final, winning two. They’re flex support is the Overwatch League MVP. To top it all off most of the Korean Overwatch World Cup team is from the NYXL. To say that this is the best team in the league is an understatement.
There were cracks in the armor however. What the community had largely attributed to sandbagging may have had more behind it. The current double sniper meta seemed a perfect for the team such as theirs but in the last meta they were slow to adapt. The team has a number of extremely talented players, so much so that they can weather the storm of any meta shift, but that didn’t carry them all the way. New York recorded three losses in Stage Four, the most they had in any stage, and were defeated in the Stage Final.
The Fusion, in their game against New York yesterday, were outstanding. They had to be to make it this far. The key to their success though was their defense. They stalled, staggered, and held the best team in the league. While this match went the distance a look at the maps Philly did win is telling. Any time that it came down to moving the payload the Fusion would always complete the map, even if barely so. The task then was to keep their opponent from doing the same thing. It sounds simple but that was their strategy and they executed it. The executed it right through every overtime all the way the the Grand Finals.
The Philadelphia Fusion will face off against the London Spitfire in the Overwatch League Grand Finals. Both teams will be competing in the Barclays center in New York to a sold out crowd. The first match begins at 4 PM PST this Friday, July 27th. You wont want to miss it.
