The eighth Cycle of the HoN Tour Diamond Division is in the books, the regular season of HoN Tour is in the books and Stay Green walks out with the last Diamond Division Championship and the #1 spot in the standings.
Stay Green is delivering a milestone after another. Last Cycle the team managed to win an entire Cycle without dropping a single map, now they are the first team to win three consecutive Diamond Division Championships. They are also pushing Trademark eSports from the throne for good in the standings, capturing the coveted #1 seed for the Grand Finals in Las Vegas, Nevada. On top of that the team is also tying the four overall Diamond Division of Trademark eSports and are among only two teams that have ever won the Diamond Division in the first season.
This particular closing Cycle of the regular season started with the upset of Afraid, who were able to defeat Stay Green in the second round of the Upper Bracket with a clear 2-0 score. The team around Jollem snapped a 10-game winning streak of the Miami powerhouse and moved on further in the tournament. Stay Green answered the bell after that and delivered a flawless end of the tournament without a single map loss once again. They went on a complete tear against their competition with 2-0 victories over Pikachu, Lions eSports, Trademark eSports, Absolute Legends and Tt eSports to even make it to the Grand Finals of the final HoN Tour Cycle of the season.
In that Grand Finals they had to come back from a 1-0 deficit due to their entrance from the Lower Bracket, but still on the servers they earned a clear and exciting 3-0 victory over their rivals from compLexity Gaming. While the first two matches were rather quick affairs, the third one ended the regular season on a high note on showcased once again the variety and excitement that Heroes of Newerth is able to deliver. compLexity Gaming tried to catch Stay Green off guard with a Midas and Gladiator pick up and looked like the winner of the match for a long time, until the final push. Gladiator was fully equipped with a Genjuro, Shrunken Head and even a Token of Life and a Doombringer in his item slots.
Unfortunately the coordination of Stay Green to get the Token off of him very quickly and then drop him another time to get a hand on that Doombringer was just too good and almost perfectly orchestrated with Wildsoul hitting too quick and too hard for coL to handle. After that the Doombringer was on the side of Stay Green and the deal was sealed.
Final Standing in the Diamond Cycle 8
1. Place:
Stay Green - $4,000 USD + 4,000 points2. Place:
compLexity Gaming - $2,500 USD + 2,500 points3. Place:
Tt eSports - $2,000 USD + 2,000 points4. Place:
Absolute Legends - $1,500 USD + 1,500 points5.-6. Place:
Afraid - $1,000 USD + 1,000 points5.-6. Place:
Trademark eSports - $1,000 USD + 1,000 pointsNext on the HoN calender are the HoN Tour Playoffs with the seeds from #4 down to #11 will compete for the last ticket to Las Vegas, Nevada. Slight changes in that tournament are already known with Absolute Legends forfeiting their spot due to scheduling issues. Currently it is not quite clear who will take over the spot of them. Originally it was supposed to be #12 team Justice League, but they might not be able to field five players. #13 Vietnamese Dream is looking like they disbanded with the closing of HoN Tour, so it would come down to One Trick Pony to take the last spot. Official confirmation is expected in a couple of hours.
While compLexity Gaming can already start practicing for the big end of Season 1 in Las Vegas, Trademark eSports and Stay Green will travel to Thailand in order to compete in the Garena Star League against the best that the SEA scene has to offer.
