Bad News Bears best Triumph to advance to ESL Pro League
After a "five-map" thriller your ESEA Premier Season 36 champions are Bad New Bears. They overcame the 1-0 upper bracket advantage given to Triumph to advance to ESL Pro League Season 14 without an organization supporting their day-to-day activities.
Triumph had a golden opportunity to put Bad News Bears into a position where they would need to reverse sweep to win the ESEA Premier title, but failed to slam the squeaky door shut on Nuke. They led 13-11 late, but Bad News Bears won five of the last six rounds of the map to even the series at one map apiece. Peter "ptr" Gurney and Jonathan "Jonji" Carey combined for 51 kills, while Wesley "viz" Harris and David "cynic" Polster had 20 frags each in the loss.
Bad News Bears carried that momentum into Inferno, a venue that ptr noted in the post-match interview should have been banned by Triumph. His confidence on that particular map proved to be well-founded, as Bad News Bears successfully planted and detonated the bomb six rounds in a row on their T-side en route to a convincing 11-4 lead at halftime. Their CT-side was just as convincing as they allowed Triumph just one round as they took a 2-1 lead in the series. Jonji was a big factor for Bad News Bears once again, this time with 20 frags in 21 rounds, while Alan "Shakezullah" Hardeman led Triumph with 13 kills in the loss.
But Triumph were still showing signs of life on Train, as they convincingly won their pick with superior preparation and execution, a fact that ptr openly praised his opposition for in the post-match interview. One round in particular summed this map up perfectly, as Triumph passed through an unguarded smoke in Ivy and wrapped all the way around to the inner bombsite, where they found three kills on unsuspecting CT players that were completely fixated on the upper halls. Brendan "Bwills" Williams and Austin "Cooper" Abadir led Triumph's successful attempt to force a fifth-map decider with 25 and 24 kills, respectively, while ptr led Bad News Bears with 18 frags in the loss.
Anyone who stayed up for the final map last night could see that Bad News Bears weren't going to be denied. They jumped out to a 9-0 lead before Triumph even managed their first round and finished the half up 11-4. After catching flak for being less impactful than usual in the earlier rounds of the Premier playoffs, Jonji showed up when it mattered most, leaving no doubt that he and ptr deserved an ESL Pro League berth this time around after falling short against forZe just a year and a half ago. The Canadian finished with 20 kills in the deciding map, a server-high 82 kills in the entire series, and a spot in ESL Pro League Season 14.
TriumphBad News Bears| Triumph |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Austin 'Cooper' Abadir |
70 - 64 | +6 | 69.4 | 67.0% | 1.06 |
| Alan 'Shakezullah' Hardeman |
60 - 64 | -4 | 74.4 | 74.0% | 1.05 |
| David 'cynic' Polster |
66 - 64 | +2 | 74.5 | 71.0% | 1.03 |
| Brendan 'Bwills' Williams |
63 - 63 | +0 | 67.2 | 72.0% | 1.00 |
| Wesley 'viz' Harris |
57 - 71 | -14 | 66.6 | 70.0% | 0.92 |
| Bad News Bears |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Jonathan 'Jonji' Carey |
82 - 73 | +9 | 102.9 | 67.0% | 1.30 |
| Peter 'ptr' Gurney |
71 - 52 | +19 | 72.8 | 82.0% | 1.25 |
| Michael 'Swisher' Schmid |
67 - 67 | +0 | 66.8 | 68.0% | 1.00 |
| Nick 'alter' Jackson |
57 - 67 | -10 | 66.0 | 74.0% | 1.00 |
| Gabe 'Spongey' Greiner |
47 - 58 | -11 | 48.6 | 66.0% | 0.82 |
The final standings for ESEA Premier Season 36 are:
1. Bad News Bears - $20,000 and ESL Pro League Season 14
2. Triumph - $12,500
3. 
RBG -$7,500
4. High Coast -$4,000
5-6. Recon 5 - $2,000
5-6. GGPR - $2,000
7-8. Mythic - $1,000
7-8. ChocoCheck - $1,000
For every team listed above that isn't Bad News Bears, ESEA Premier Season 37 will begin on May 4th. You'll find all of the latest news about roster changes and other relevant updates right here on Dust2.us, stay tuned.
