San Francisco Shock has qualified for the Overwatch League playoff Grand Finals after beating New York Excelsior in the Loser's bracket final.
Shock continued their dominant Loser's bracket run, having been knocked down in the opening round after a 4-3 loss to Atlanta Reign. Since then, Shock have beat all their opponents 4-0; knocking out London Spitfire, Los Angeles Gladiators, Hangzhou Spark and now Excelsior. They've got heaps of momentum heading into the finals where they will face Vancouver Titans who beat New York Excelsior 4-3 in the Winners' Finals.
The match against Excelsior wasn't all plain sailing â with New York clearly showing why they are a top Overwatch team, it was surprising not to see them take even one map from Shock. Regardless of how well New York was playing, Shock was simply better, with MVP Jay "sinatraa" Won leading his team to victory.
This season, San Francisco has seen grand finals at every stage, only winning it in Stage 2. They have placed second throughout the season, the definition of silver surfers, and getting to the grand final through the Loser's bracket seems like we may be seeing more of the same this coming weekend.
Also, it's worth noting that the playoffs have seen teams finish pretty much perfectly in order according to their seeding. Vancouver Titans are ranked first and reached the grand final through the winner's bracket, whilst NYXL are ranked second according to current seeding they are third in the overall season standings behind San Francisco Shock. The teams that finished fourth to eighth â Spark, Reign, Gladiators and Seoul Dynasty â finished in perfect accordance to their seeding.
The Overwatch League playoff Grand Final takes place on Sunday, September 29, with Vancouver Titans and San Francisco Shock heading to the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, home of the Philadelphia Flyers, Philadelphia 76ers and Philadelphia Soul. Let us know who you think is taking the win in the comments!