Noly’s Revenge, APAC’s Greatest Rivalry, and more takeaways from this weekend’s RLCS
The final results of this weekend’s RLCS tournaments were business as usual for the most part, especially in the more visible regions: BDS continues to look like the best Rocket League team in history, and Furia finally overcame KRU to regain their position as the best team in South America. The most fun you could have as a viewer wasn’t in the grand finals, for the most part; instead, it was following the emergence and resurgence of different rosters and players as well as watching the rivalries that the season has created reach a climax. Let’s dive in.
In Europe, Revenge Is A Dish Best Served Swept
Karmine Corp’s Noly - Photo Courtesy of Liquipedia Rocket League
Of all the non-BDS matchups in the Tour de Rocket League, the two most one-sided were Endpoint’s 3-0 win over SMPR and Karmine Corp’s 4-0 victory over Guild. It’s not uncommon for sweeps to be closer than the series score indicates, with 1-goal victories and overtimes determining multiple matches. This was not the case for these series, with Endpoint outscoring SMPR 15-4 across only three games and KC dominating Guild 12-3.
What made these matchups exciting to watch, more so than any other stomp this year, was that both featured a player who had recently transferred away from the team. People love a good revenge story; it’s why they continue to churn out films, books and TV shows centered around it. For Archie, the charismatic former prodigy who once starred under the SMPR banner and was the anchor of a top-4 Major finish in the Fall, his performance against former teammates Kassio and Chausette45 came off as a reminder of who made them go. Archie averaged an absurd 560 points per game, along with a 1.65 Octane rating. It was the best Archie has looked since the Fall, and may have been the motivation he needed to put himself back in top-5 player conversations and for Endpoint to make their third consecutive LAN.
Archie’s performance was entertaining, but it wasn’t nearly as satisfying as watching what Noly did to Guild. Unlike Archie, who is still technically contracted under SMPR and seemed to have a generally cordial departure, Noly was dropped without even being told; he found out from a Shift release and had to scramble to find a new roster, eventually ending up on Karmine Corp. With a top-4 placement on the line, Noly made sure to remind Guild why he was their flagship player for almost two years, putting up 500 points per game and a 1.58 Octane rating in the sweep. Seeing Noly, who seemed fully invested in leading Guild to success for years to come, lose his spot in the way he did was heartbreaking. It made watching him getting his revenge all that much sweeter.
Tokyo Verdy & Detonator Has Become the RLCS’ Most Intense Rivalry
Detonator Rocket League - Photo Courtesy of @OlpixRL
Due to the length of the season and increased parity in most regions of the RLCS, it’s hard to find a true rivalry between teams. The few that are still around- G2 vs NRG and Vitality and BDS- have become awfully lopsided, and are less fun than they were even a few months ago. If you’re looking for a real rivalry, fit with bracket resets, back-and-forth results, and a whole lot of seven-game series, you’ll have to tune into APAC North, where Tokyo Verdy and Detonator are currently waging the tensest two-team war across a split that we’ve seen this entire season.
Since Detonator shocked the Rocket League world in the APAC qualifier to make LAN last split, they’ve become a true second powerhouse to Verdy in the region. It’s resulted in the Spring seeing some of its best series come between the two. In both regional upper finals, Detonator has snatched a hard-fought, seven-game victory from Verdy. Verdy has reappeared in the Grand Finals on both occasions, bracket-resetting them in a dominant 4-1, 4-0 fashion in the first regional. This time around, Detonator showed much more fight in the first series of the Grand Finals, but Verdy ultimately took it 4-3 and forced another bracket reset. Unfortunately for Verdy, Detonator finally figured it out in the second series, and took the regional 4-1.
This won’t be the last time we see Detonator and Verdy play; now tied in Spring points, the next time they meet will decide who gets the #1 seed in the APAC qualifier, a vital position as the #2 seed will have to play APAC North giants Gaimin Gladiators in the first round. Should either Verdy or Detonator take the APAC qualifier to London, they’ll most likely lock up the APAC South spot at Worlds, making it the most important tournament of the year for both teams. We’re looking forward to seeing which of the two teams truly has what it takes to claw their way out of the region and into Dallas.
Forget The Future, Team Liquid Is The Now
Team Liquid’s AcroniK - Photo Courtesy of BS+COMPETITION
In the last Takeaways chapter that featured a European regional, we noted that with time, the young talent of Team Liquid would grow into a monster, and contend for LAN titles all through RLCS ‘22-’23. While that holds true more than ever after the Tour de Rocket League, we may have overestimated how long it would take for them to make their mark on the region. With a top-2 finish and only disaster in Regional 3 keeping them from the Spring Major, Team Liquid didn’t wait for next season to impose themselves on the rest of Europe; they’re here now and will be for a long time.
Liquid’s full-send offensive playstyle and roster of mechanical wizards makes watching them very similar to Moist Esports, in which they can overcommit and make silly mistakes but also completely overwhelm any team that doesn’t happen to have the most flawless 3s player in RLCS history on their side (looking at you, MonkeyMoon). Before running into BDS, they ran over three teams that all made the Winter Major, only dropping two games total to Evil Genuises, Dignitas, and Moist en route to the upper finals. In the losers’ final, they stopped the red-hot Karmine Corp in their tracks in a 4-3 thriller. For a team that made their RLCS debut just two weeks ago, these are unprecedented results. And if they do make London, expect to see a flurry of highlights and maybe even a deep run from this team of prodigal talents.
The Club Is Back, And They Want Their Worlds Spot
The Club’s AztromicK - Photo Courtesy of Rocket League Esports
If you don’t recognize the name The Club, it’s probably because a) you haven’t seen them in a while, and b) they haven’t always been named The Club. In the Fall, the roster was signed to eRa Eternity. Following a successful Fall in which they qualified for LAN, they failed to repeat their success in the Winter and had to watch their organization go broke. Despite all the turmoil that went on in the Winter Split, AztromicK and kv1 regrouped with new member Lostt under The Club’s banner, and are once again in the hunt for a LAN spot, one that would put them over Team Secret in the rankings and qualify them for Worlds.
The Club represents the beauty of the RLCS format- you can have an off-split or make a roster move and still have time to stay in contention for Worlds. To be fair, The Club’s road to the Spring Major, and Worlds, is still far away: they’d have to finish top-2 and Team Secret would have to finish outside the top 4 in order for them to overtake them. But with nothing to lose and Dallas to gain, it’s hard to imagine The Club not leaving it all on the pitch in their final push to retake their spot in international competition. We’ll be rooting for them.
In Just Two Matches, Stizzy Puts The World On Notice
Aogiri - Photo Courtesy of Liquipedia Rocket League
The time period in which a player is viewed as the bright young star of the RLCS is getting shorter and shorter. Gone are the days when JSTN was heralded as the rookie to watch for months on end; now, players like Seikoo, Daniel, and Aqua are treated as veterans despite only having one or two splits under their belt. Even Oski and Atow, the two fifteen-year-olds on Liquid, are old news after just two regionals. Instead, the spotlight shines on Stizzy, the Spanish youngster who put on a show in just two matches this past weekend.
Playing as a part of Aogiri alongside VKSailen and Oscillon, Stizzy was welcomed to the RLCS via a matchup with Moist Esports, which is about as rough as you can have it for your first go at the pros. Nobody would’ve faulted him or the rest of his team if they were swept. Yet after the first two games, Aogiri found themselves on triple match-point. They were eventually reverse swept (Moist does have an affinity for content), but Stizzy had made his mark on anyone who was watching. He averaged a 1.4 Octane rating, by far the highest in the lobby, and nearly knocked off Europe’s #1 seed in his first-ever RLCS match. Up against Solary in the lower bracket, it was more of the same: Aogiri lost 3-1, but Stizzy averaged nearly 600 points per game.
The French and British are no strangers to fifteen-year-old prodigies, but Stizzy is the first Spanish superstar to emerge in quite a while. It’ll be interesting to see if, like other teams in Europe, Spain’s best decide to team up and use the power of speaking the same language to make consistent deep runs. With Luminosity’s AtomiK in danger of a third straight split barely missing LAN and Marc_by_8 sitting on BDS’ bench, there’s definitely Spanish talent for Stizzy to recruit should Aogiri fail to continue improving. Even if a Spanish superteam isn’t on his mind, expect to be seeing Stizzy put on dazzling performances for the foreseeable future as more and more people get familiar with the RLCS’ newest young standout.