It’s been another exciting week in the world of EPIC League. With one week of the group stage left, the teams are making their last stand to claim a spot in the upper bracket, or in some cases, to remain in Division 1 at all.
New contender for the best of the worst
For the past two weeks,
Alliance,
Team Liquid and
Just Error have been neck and neck (and neck) in the bottom three of the group stage. The bottom two teams of the group stage will be relegated to Division 2 of the league, making it critical for these three teams to be the one that breaks away to the top 8.
This week we saw Team Liquid do just that; they won both of their series, putting them at a comfortable seventh place. Alliance and Just error are still at the bottom of the pile after this week, but they are now joined by
Mudgolems who lost four series in a row.
With the bottom teams having two or three series left to prove themselves, the final days of the group stage will be very tense.
Team Secret quietly return to the top
For the first half of the group stage,
Team Secret have remained around the middle of the group stage rankings. Alongside their recent defeat at ESL One Germany, people thought the magic had finally fizzled out. Or maybe they’re just tired after several months of being the world’s best Dota 2 team? Either way, a downturn in their performance seemed inevitable, however a busy week for Team Secret has seen them rise to third place in the groups. With two more series to go, they have a real chance of matching
Vikin.gg who have held onto first place for the group stage so far.
Game of the week
In the final series of the week, Team Secret gave us something to
really get excited about in game 2 of their series against Alliance. The classic Magnus + Phantom Assassin combo has been making a comeback lately, and Secret showed it at peak performance this game. To really make those empowered crits sting, Lasse “Matumbaman” Urpalainen built not one, not two, but three Divine Rapiers. If you like big crits, make sure you watch a replay of this one. Don’t forget your Ghost Scepter though.
You can keep up with the last week of the group stage with our
event hub. Who do you think will make it through to the main event?