After a close 2-1 series, Entity were able to triumph and keep their major chances alive as they eliminated Evil Geniuses from Arlington!
In the second Arlington Major elimination series of the day, Evil Geniuses took on Entity. This series was incredibly important for both teams. Neither have enough points to directly qualify for TI. That means whoever lost would have to play through grueling TI qualifiers. For many team, this is their last chance to qualify to TI
EG steamroll over Entity in game one
The first draft started with with often memed Abed "Abed" Yusop Storm Spirit. Eg also went with Tal "Fly" Aizik's new favorite hero, the Dazzle. Entity in the meantime went for classic heroes for their team. They picked up the Batrider for Daniel "Stormstormer" Schoetzau and the Vladislav "Kataomi`" Semenov Winter Wyvern. Entity looked for a fast aggressive draft, picking up a Bristleback for stand-in carry, Jonas "SabeRLight-" Volek. In the mean time, EG looked for objective taking with the non-meta Luna for Artour "Arteezy" Babaev.
The laning stage started out pretty even. However EG were able to rack up a kill lead with great rotations from Abed and the quick mobility of Andreas "Cr1t-" Nielsen on Marci. The speed of Egor "Nightfall" Grigorenko on Nightstalker also made several tower dives possible. EG continued to ramp up the aggression and racked up even more kills and took the first Roshan. EG continued to just roll over Entity as they won team fight after team fight. The rest of the game was clinical for EG, and they won with relative ease. Entity finished the game with only six kills.
Entity turn the steamroller back on EG
In game two, Entity still tried to stick to their players strengths. They picked up the Enigma for "Tobi" Buchner and the Wyvern again for Kataomi. EG continued to play to Abed's strengths with Puck and picked up the classic Arteezy Terroblade. Entity still continued getting more comfort with the Bane pick for Dzmitry "Fishman" Palishchuk. EG opted for some slight experimentation with an Undying pick, strong against the high strength heroes on Entity. It was the first Undying pick of the tournament.
The laning stage was again quite even with most of the action happening in the bot lane. Nightfall's Razor dueled it out with the Tobi Enigma. The supports and cores traded kills while the rest of the map pretty comfortably farmed. however, Stormstormer was able to get an early mid tower kill despite Abed having a decent game. Continuing into the early-to-mid game it was still very evenin, with fights around the bottom tower and both team's trading farm. Entity were able to get a great pick off onto the Puck into order to get an early Roshan to jumpstart their game. After this point, Entity were able to jump key heroes seemingly with EG being able to do anything. The overwhelming team fight and pick off from Entity absolutely destroyed EG in this game two.
They are inevitable
Surprising no one, Entity again went for the Kataomi Winter Wyvern again at the Arlington Major. Also to no ones surprise, EG picked up Puck for Abed again. They also decided to go for sustain with the Warlock for Fly and Death Prophet for Nightfall. However, Entity got a great Beastmaster pick that does exceptionally well versus all of EG's heroes. EG had a last pick Alchemist but the panel seemed to think that the Entity draft rounded out better.
Entity had a great start to the early game, pressuring Arteezy by putting Saberlight on the Beastmaster. Stormstomer's Tiny also was able to come out pretty ahead on the mid lane. Arteezy really struggled as he was pushed out of almost every safe place to farm on the map. EG did seem to equalize after getting some space for Arteezy with some pickoffs. However, Entity were able to get Roshan and then take a key fight to properly propel themselves into control. Entity just continued to destroy EG any time they tried to take a fight, continuously pounded EG until they eventually won the game.
Entity successfully eliminated EG and kept the dream alive to qualify to TI. EG will very likely now have to play through the NA qualifiers to make it to TI. Entity will play against Boom next to see if they continue in the tournament. How will Entity fare in the rest of the Arlington major? Keep up with us on Dota 2 news here at esports.gg!