The Minnesota RØKKR have defied the odds in an amazing reverse sweep over the Toronto Ultra in the grand finals of the Call of Duty League Stage 5 Major. Toronto went up 4-0, but faulted as the European squad had to close out the best-of-nine series. What followed could be the best comeback that professional Call of Duty has ever seen.
The RØKKR, coming from the winner’s bracket, were facing a red-hot loser’s bracket team who had just played two matches on championship Sunday. The lack of an advantage for a successful winner’s bracket run was clear in this matchup. Players have not been a fan of a format that lacks a bracket reset or one game advantage. This, in part, led to an onslaught by the Ultra in the first four maps.
RØKKR take five straight maps to win the Stage 5 Major
🏆 achieved the impossible 🏆
GGs @TorontoUltra
Series: 5-4
📺 : https://t.co/5Hp6RTD7Ne#ROKKR | #PlayAsOne | #CDL2021 pic.twitter.com/jdoLI3sF4Z
— Minnesota RØKKR (@ROKKR) August 2, 2021
Toronto took map after map in convincing fashion. RØKKR looked like they hadn’t played a series in weeks and didn’t seem up to taking down the Stage 2 Major champions. In map five, though, a switch was flipped on Miami Search and Destroy.
Rookie Eli “Standy” Bentz began to pick off the Ultra players like he was playing in a public lobby. Thanks to the efforts of Standy and the support from his teammates, Preston “Priestaah” Grenier, Dillon “Attach” Price and Mike “MajorManiak” Szymaniak, RØKKR finally took a map in the grand finals.
Standy is a savage on LAN
Attach joined Standy in the slaying of Ultra and soon, no one on Toronto could touch a RØKKR player. MajorManiak and Priestaah took over in the slaying department, posting above 1.50 Kill/Death Ratios in the map seven Search and Destroy and the map eight Hardpoint.
The total team efforts from the RØKKR led to the final map, Search and Destroy on Raid. From here, it was the Standy and Attach show once again. Although, it was Standy who seemingly made play after play. He finished the final map with a whopping 2.40 KD and led Minnesota to the Stage 5 Major win.
🙏 @Staaandy 🙏
📺 : https://t.co/5Hp6RTD7Ne#ROKKR | #PlayAsOne | #CDL2021 pic.twitter.com/zStg3W70be
— Minnesota RØKKR (@ROKKR) August 2, 2021
Standy was named the Player of the Stage but Attach was the MVP of the grand finals. He posted a 1.15 KD in the series, the only RØKKR member with above a 1.00. When speaking about the comeback, Attach cited the team’s ability to keep having fun, even when down 0-4.
“Even when we went down 4-0, we were obviously getting smoked the first couple of maps, but we just said ‘there’s still no pressure.’ And we just started having fun, we started laughing, having a good time.”
Call of Duty esports might never see another series like the grand finals of the Stage 5 Major. It capped off one of the best events in recent memory for the esport, with the fans in attendance giving it an extra level of electricity. Hopefully, this is an omen for good things to come at CDL Champs in three weeks.
