North American teams stumble in Valencia
The first day of play of DreamHack Showdown has concluded in Valencia, Spain, with the three North American sides present having a mixed bag of results.
Dignitas fe kicked off the event with authority, absolutely battering the Malaysian ladies of Orange.Sphynx 16-2. It was Amanda "rain" Smith leading the way for her team, followed by stand-in Melisa "Theia" Mundorff.
Next up was the all-North American match of CLG Red up against FOREVER 21, the latter of which with benched CLG member Benita "bENITA" Novshadian in tow. Despite bENITA's side securing the opening pistol, the rest of the half was all CLG Red as trial member Catherine "CAth" Leroux helped them to a 12-3 lead.
After winning the second pistol CLG Red looked poised to close out the map, but Klaudia "klaudia" Beczkiewicz and FOREVER 21 were able to string some rounds together to reach 15-9 before capitulating.
The Group A winners match between Dignitas fe and Demise fe was as close as possible, with the Europeans slightly leading 8-7 at the half. Dignitas would take the second pistol, but immediately lose the following round, sending Demise on a six-round streak to push their lead to 14-8. Dignitas followed this up with seven rounds in a row of their own, but were unable to claim the final round, thus seeing the match go to overtime.
Three overtimes later, despite a phenomenal showing from Theia and rain, Dignitas fe were cast down to the lower bracket by Vanessa "Nessa" Ahlström and Demise fe.
The final match of the day saw CLG Red pitted against Besiktas. Showing signs of their form from when they were the best female team in the world, it was the European squads' match the whole time, with Petra "Petra" Stoker leading the way.
Today's results sets up the following matches for tomorrow:
Orange.Sphynx | vs. | Copenhagen Flames fe | 5 AM EDT |
7PM fe | vs. | FOREVER 21 | 8 AM EDT |
Dignitas fe | vs. | O.S/CPH Flames winner | 11 AM EDT |
CLG Red | vs. | 7PM/FOREVER 21 winner | 2 PM EDT |
All remaining matches in the event will be best-of-three. Already in the playoffs and awaiting the winners of tomorrow's decider matches are Demise fe and Besiktas.