posted by Malystryx.GDS,
With a handful of their typical heroes banned out including Shadow Fiend and Outworld Devourer Team EG were forced out of their comfort zone in their final group stage match against Invictus Gaming.
PPD in pre-match talk




Team EG's PPD was confident in the pre-match talk, expecting no other outcome aside from a 1st place finish. When asked who they would like to face next he said "We prefer to play against Alliance, we know them better. DK are like the best team here, we’ll save them for later." We'll save them for later - might be incredible foresight by the American given how well their team did against Invictus Gaming in the match.

The draft was far from a typical one for Team EG, with Arteezy opting for a Dragon Knight mid, a hero he had only played 3 times in the last 2 months. However, it did not seem like it. Zai swooping in to support mid with his Dazzle, led to the first major blunder of the game. A terrible mistake by iG saw Ferrari cast Song of the Sirens just as Chuan burrow striked, meaning Chuan would not have his initiation for when the Naga's ultimate wore off. It was extremely bad coordination and resulted in Team EG then taking out Ferrari's Naga. The hunter became the hunted.



By 10 minutes in, EternalEnvy had the highest networth of the game with 70CS Doom with a Hand of Midas and Arcane boots. With the success of his team-mates in putting iG under pressure, four minutes later Arteezy DK had a Shadowblade finished up and EternalEnvy added a blink Dagger to his already impressive inventory. Arteezy and EternalEnvy had great success together in Speed Gaming beating Team DK in the finals of MLG Columbus, and although EE-sama only joined Team EG as a stand-in for us Fear, the team is looking like a well-oiled machine.

Despite an oversight at iG's bottom tier1 where a failed stomp resulted in EG's Dragon Knight and Doom both falling, Team EG were firing on all cylinders. At 20 minutes, Arteezy's DK was just charging past iG's tier4 with no regard for his own safety. Team EG looked ridiculously confident, with Arteezy racking up three triple-kills diving into battles with his physical DPS coupled with BKB later on. Chuan's Sand King did pull of a couple of good Epicenters but the damage was neglible against EG's tanky Doom and Dragon Knight.

This was an EG masterclass, with iG looking washed out. This is a magnificent end to Evil Geniuses groupstage finishing with 3 wins out of 3, and making them the hot favourite to win the competition along with Team DK. Will Arteezy and EE-sama combo get another swing at Team DK in the playoffs? Group B will now play a three-way tiebreaker to decide which other team joins the double elimination.



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