Day 2 of the Halo Championship Series (HCS) Kickoff Major Raleigh tournament has followed up Day 1 with more big plays, as teams and players are progressing through the brackets. Now that a large number of teams are starting to get filtered, moments of brilliance are shining with more importance.
Day 2 leads to brackets clashing to make it to the end
After the length of Day 1, the matchups of Day 2 were even more competitive. On Day 2 of HCS Raleigh, we got to see Sentinels for the first time on the main stage, sweeping The Boys 3-0. Considering the partnered team lost a player and had to start in the open bracket, they won each map by a significant score. They showed everyone why they were a pool team originally. That was in the first round of the winners bracket, where Sentinels then had to face pool play team OpTic Gaming. Former OpTic player Matt “FormaL” Piper, now playing on Sentinels as a temporary substitute, faced his old teammates on OpTic. With the entire bracket now decided, open bracket teams and pool play teams now face off to see who makes it to the end of the tournament.
With the two brackets clashing, there were plenty of great individual and team plays to highlight on Day 2 of HCS Raleigh.
Justin “iGotUrPistola” Deese, OpTic Gaming
ICE. #OpTicHalo pic.twitter.com/3T7meDsRf8
— OpTic Gaming™ (@OpTic) December 18, 2021
On the Slayer game mode, where the first to 50 kills wins, OpTic and Pioneers were both close to winning. OpTic needed one kill, and Pioneers needed two. Some smart, sneaky and passive positioning led to a clutch flank kill from Pistola. That sole flank won the map for OpTic. That wasn’t even the only play from Pistola for the day, as he had another sneaky play against Sentinels.
🚩🏃🏽 @iGotUrPistola pic.twitter.com/w16kvBMNAg
— OpTic Gaming™ (@OpTic) December 18, 2021
This time, when even on Map 1 against Sentinels, the opposing team pushed and failed to grab OpTic’s flag. That was when Pistola snuck around and got the first flag of the round. This helped OpTic win the first map against Sentinels, as all his former teammate FormaL could do was watch.
Acend against Status Quo
The EU titans @AcendClub advance to Winners Round 2 with a 3-0 sweep against @TeamStatusQuo! pic.twitter.com/frGUwvRoIr
— Halo Esports (@HCS) December 18, 2021
After a roller-coaster of a first day, European team Acend made waves for multiple reasons. They beat XSET in the longest series in Halo history 3-2, putting EU teams on the map. But, they also only took one map off of Cloud9 in a 3-1 loss. Then they earned a statement win over Status Quo, solidifying their mark. On Capture The Flag, Map 3, a stout defense from Acend kept Status Quo off of their flag. This ended up winning the map and the series.
