Two of the biggest organizations in Call of Duty esports will collide in a pivotal semifinal match at CWL Anaheim.
OpTic Gaming and 100 Thieves, who have a permanent link through 100 Thieves’ founder and owner Matthew “Nadeshot” Haag, have won their respective first-round matches at CWL Anaheim to secure a matchup against each other. This will be the first meeting between the teams since their winners bracket finals encounter at CWL London in May, where 100 Thieves prevailed in four maps.
Related: Bracket play results for CWL Anaheim 2019
Enigma6 and Gen.G will meet in the other semifinal. Both of these teams have been pleasant surprises, but E6’s run through pool play and the first round of the winners bracket has undoubtedly been the biggest shock.
OpTic Gaming vs. FaZe Clan
Unlike OpTic’s relatively smooth pool play performances, OpTic ran into some problems early on against FaZe Clan, who started the series with a dominant Hardpoint victory. The second game, Arsenal Search and Destroy, was much closer, but FaZe prevailed again, which assuredly scared the Green Wall.
But OpTic turned it around on Control, FaZe’s best game mode. OpTic took their first map of the series, seemingly igniting the team’s comeback. OpTic corrected their issues from the first Hardpoint and took the second to tie the series at two games apiece. And just as they had turned things around from their first Hardpoint, they made similar adjustments from their first Search and Destroy to complete the reverse sweep.
100 Thieves vs. Elevate
While 100 Thieves didn’t have as much trouble with Elevate as OpTic had with FaZe, Elevate didn’t let the CWL London champions get by easily.
100 Thieves’ respawn play continued to impress in the series, which made things nearly impossible for Elevate. 100T won each of the three respawn game modes, and the only loss they suffered in the series came on Hacienda Search and Destroy, a map in which 100 Thieves lost the 11th round.
100 Thieves will have to stay hot in the respawns against OpTic, whom 100T bested in three respawn maps in London.
Enigma6 vs. Team Heretics
Arguably the most unpredictable match of the bunch, Enigma6 vs. Team Heretics included two teams that had been somewhat lackluster in the CWL Pro League. Fortunately for E6, they’ve seemingly found their footing in Anaheim, which made things much easier in this match.
E6 quickly grabbed the 2-0 series lead by winning the opening Hardpoint and crushing the Spaniards in Search and Destroy. Heretics delayed the loss for a little longer, though, thanks to an impressive comeback in Control and a tight win in the second Hardpoint.
But in the end, E6’s Search and Destroy prowess seemed to be too much for Heretics, who fell to E6 in eight rounds on Hacienda to end the series.
Gen.G vs. eUnited
As one of the favorites to win the entire event, eUnited obviously weren’t expected to fall so quickly in the championship bracket. Unfortunately for them, Gen.G apparently found whatever they lost in recent times to get back to being a contender.
And despite winning the opening Hardpoint by 80 points, eUnited were unable to get much more to swing in their favor against Gen.G. Instead, Gen.G locked up three consecutive map wins, including a 3-0 sweep on Frequency Control, to punch their proverbial ticket to the semifinals against Enigma6.
In addition to the two semifinal matches, teams are still fighting in the losers bracket in the hopes of making it all the way to the grand finals.
Published: Jun 15, 2019 07:25 pm