OpTic Reclaims the Halo Throne: UGC St. Louis Championship Sunday Recap

After having some December blues, OpTic Gaming has taken back the Halo title belt from Team EnVyUs, and have left Collinsville, Illinois with the St. Louis Halo World Championship 2017 Qualifier trophy, as well as $20,000.

The top four teams of last season’s pro league wound up being the top four teams of the event, but their journey to this point was not easy.

On the brink of elimination by the young gun pro side Inconceivable, Str8 Rippin organized a reverse sweep to stay in contention, but later fell to Team Liquid in the quarterfinals.

That same Liquid team then pulled a stunner on Team EnVyUs, who lost a crucial game five to the eventual champions of OpTic Gaming.

Unlike their recent conquest though, they were not able to win back-to-back best of sevens, and fell to the #Greenwall in six games.

With the amount of roster changes before this event, Team Liquid at least seemed to be the biggest winners in the roster swaps, being the only team to break through the top two teams of the league in OG and nV. However, this tournament showed that the gap between the best teams in Halo may be shorter than it was in 2016, and that the tournaments to come may feature some intense competition.

Here is the full recap of the games played today, as well as the final standings:

Losers Round 2

#11 Inconceivable 3 – 0 #16 Team Randa

#13 Team Allegiance 3 – 0 #10 SetToDestroyX

#5 Luminosity Gaming 3 – 1 #7 PNDA Gaming

#6 Evil Geniuses 3 – 0 #9 Velvet Gaming

Losers Round 3

#11 Inconceivable 3 – 1 #13 Team Allegiance

#6 Evil Geniuses 3 – 0 #5 Luminosity Gaming

Winners Semifinals

#1 Team EnVyUs 3 – 2 #4 Str8 Rippin

#2 OpTic Gaming 3 – 2 #3 Team Liquid

Losers Quarterfinals

#4 Str8 Rippin 3 – 2 #11 Inconceivable

#3 Team Liquid 3 – 1 #6 Evil Geniuses

Losers Semifinals

#3 Team Liquid 3 – 1 #4 Str8 Rippin

Winners FInals

#2 OpTic Gaming 3 – 2 #1 Team EnVyUs

Losers Finals

#3 Team Liquid 3 – 2 #1 Team EnVyUs

Grand Finals

#2 OpTic Gaming 4 – 3 #3 Team Liquid

Final Placements

1st Place – $20,000

• OpTic Gaming

2nd Place – $10,000

• Team Liquid

3rd Place – $6,000

• Team EnVyUs

4th Place – $4,000

• Str8 Rippin

5th-6th Place – $3,000

• Evil Geniuses
• Inconceivable

7th-8th Place – $2,000

• Team Allegiance
• Luminosity Gaming

9th-12th Place

• SetToDestroyX
• Team Randa
• PNDA Gaming
• Velvet Gaming

13th-15th Place

• Primal
• cE.Fs Starboys
• Earthroot Gaming

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James Mattone is a journalist for GAMURS and can be contacted on Twitter –@TheJamesMattone.