The final day of the South American Dota Pro Circuit was full of twists and turns. In a best of three against regional rivals, NoPing could wrap up the season. However, two abrupt forfeits from NoPing, in their series led to two teams with the same record. A player from NoPing suffered an apparent panic attack leading to one of the forfeits. The teams competed in a tiebreaker to determine the winner of the South American DPC regular season. The match also decided which two teams qualified for the Kiev Animajor playoffs.
The NoPing tiebreaker
The two Major spots in the South American DPC came down to the 6-0 NoPing Esports and the 5-1 beastcoast.
🥲 We have a decider match starting in few moments. Although we are at the end of #OGADPC SA Season 2, still, we are excited to see who will go to the Major!
💥 @NoPingEsports vs @beastcoast 💥
🔴Game one is live!📺https://t.co/rhWFDRzUcy #OGADPC #DPC #DOTA2 #esports pic.twitter.com/phsKoy8Nbe
— OGA Dota PIT (@OGADotaPIT) May 21, 2021
If beastcoast wins the best of three against NoPing, then a tiebreaker situation would appear as both would have a 6-1 record. In the first game beastcoast had a comfortable 8,000 net-worth advantage against NoPing. After a beautiful Chonosphere by beastcoast’s Hector “K1” Antonio Asto, NoPing called an early forfeit. The second game was a straightforward win by NoPing, which led into the third and final match that sparked confusion among the Dota 2 scene. NoPing secured a 2,000 net-worth lead at the 24-minute mark and early game control with a lineup consisting of Templar Assassin, Bristleback and Timbersaw. After an unfortunate Roshan fight where beastcoast team wiped NoPing, Jose “Panda” Padilla Hernandez suddenly paused the game, typed “gg” and disconnected.
The most insane gg I've ever seen, especially given the stakes and that they have to play another full bo3 in 20 minutes…
— Andrew Campbell (@ZyoriTV) May 21, 2021
NoPing player has apparent panic attack
After the events of the first series, NoPing esports posted a tweet publicly apologizing for the behavior of their players in the first and third game.
We would like to apologize publicly for the behavior of our players on the 1 map and on the 3 map, especially to everyone who supports us and to ask that they continue to support us despite everything, we have another best of 3 against the same opponents, worth 1 place of the DPC
— NoPing e-sports (@NoPingEsports) May 21, 2021
NoPing reset and played beastcoast again to resolve the tiebreaker. NoPing went on to win the tiebreaker and take first in the South American DPC. But, what was supposed to be an underdog story of a small-time team making an almost spotless run became mired in controversy. The third place team, Thunder Predator put out a twitlonger asking Valve to look into the issue, calling NoPing’s actions a violation of the rules.
The reality of the situation was revealed a few hours later on Farith “Matthew” Puente’s stream according to caster Andrew “Zyori” Campbell. Panda experienced a panic attack in the middle of the game due to mistakes that he made earlier and abruptly quit the game, according to Matthew.
According to Matthew’s facebook post, Panda left the game with “tearful eyes and shaking all over” in what appears to be an extreme anxiety attack that prevented him from playing further.
Source: https://t.co/1PeOpsvXv6 https://t.co/LZasRMBg8N
— Andrew Campbell (@ZyoriTV) May 22, 2021
The team still took first place in the DPC and secured their spot in the Major Playoffs.
