ESL Challenger League S44 NA nearing playoffs
While everyone was focused on the BLAST.tv Paris Major Americas RMR Closed Qualifier and ESL Pro League Season 17, ESL Challenger League has been running wild, with some teams already locked in for playoffs and other teams already planning how to approach the Relegation stage.
The competition has seen teams change players, teams leaving organizations, and other teams even leaving the competition itself. Just ssome standard North American Counter-Strike occurrences.
The ugly
One man's trash is another man's treasure, but the same can be said in reverse. With many changes that left Disconnected watching as its old players were having success with other teams, the team decided to call it quits when Matthew "D4rtyMontana" Paplawskas qualified to the Americas RMR with yur, the mix team that beat EG in the Closed Qualifier. Now, teams that haven't played against Disconnected (all the teams in the group) will get a free win, and this has already settled who will be going to the playoffs in Group B.
There's still a winless team playing, with just one game left to end their regular season, Noxious. The squad has only had two close maps in the whole tournament, not being able to show competitive performances for this level of play. Recently, the team had to forfeit the series against EG Black during the second half of the first map due to personal reasons. Noxious is 0-6 and their last game will be against Davenport, who have recently beat Vendetta.
The bad
Villainous is no more. The organization let contracts expire and decided not to renew them, leaving the squad with no support. This decision might come from the recent results the team has been seeing. Last season, Villainous managed to survive the Relegation phase, but this year things are looking worse. With a current record of 1-4, it seems like Relegation is a certainty.
Despite ATK having already qualified for playoffs, the team has been embroiled in a series of roster moves amidst Rhys "Fadey" Armstrong's departure. The team parted ways with Fadey on February 3rd, announcing Saad "Pluto" Siraj as his replacement on the 6th of the same month. However, only two weeks later he was cut from the squad. The team added Aleksandar "CacaNito" Kjulukoski to the team for ESL Pro League Season 17 and Ethan "reck" Serrano for ESL Challenger League as a stand-in. This many changes can't be healthy for the squad, but they still managed to qualify for the playoffs anyway.
The good
Things are almost set for post-season in Group B. paiN, and ATK are already confirmed in the playoffs, while Detonate and LOS + oNe are just one win away. Detonate will face the crumbling timbermen, while LOS + oNe will face Limitless. Over in Group A, the math is more complicated, with many teams still chasing the playoff spot and only MIBR guaranteed to have qualified.
Detonate, specifically, has been a good surprise lately. The team added Keller "SLIGHT" Nilan and Joshua "m1cks" Micks in what seems to be a very successful move. SLIGHT is currently the highest-rated player in his squad, and it seems that m1cks' coaching has been proving fruitful. Beyond ESL Challenger League, Detonate has managed to qualify for the BLAST.tv Paris Major Americas RMR.
Season 44 of ESL Challenger League North America is nearing its playoff stage, but there are plenty of games to be played still. Teams like Davenport, Nouns, and Strife still have a good chance of making playoffs in Group A, and it will be a cutthroat ending over in Group B with timbermen fighting for a spot in the playoffs against, most likely, Detonate.
