From second place curse to a last place curse.

Team Liquid's DreamLeague Season 23 career is over earlier than expected. The European team wasn't able to get past group stage for the fourth time in a row, making only 250 EPT points. After HEROIC's 2-0 defeat against Xtreme Gaming, they needed to beat the already eliminated PSG.Quest by 2-0. However, after an intense loss on their first game, they only managed to tie the series.

Team Liquid ties the series against an already eliminated PSG.Quest (Stats by Dotabuff)
Team Liquid ties the series against an already eliminated PSG.Quest (Stats by Dotabuff)

With this result, Team Liquid's DreamLeague Season 23 elimination was around the corner. They had to play tiebreakers with HEROIC, a team that also had mixed results during group stage. The BO3 series last game lasted more than 75 minutes, and saw the South American team get an unexpected victory.

Tiebreakers: Team Liquid vs HEROIC

As mentioned before, Team Liquid's elimination wasn't an easy task to achieve for HEROIC. The BO3 series went to a third game, but could've been a 2-0 if it wasn't for Team Liquid's experience. The team managed to come back from a +10K net worth advantage that looked like the end for them.

HEROIC wins 2-1 after a +75 minute game (Stats by Dotabuff)
HEROIC wins 2-1 after a +75 minute game (Stats by Dotabuff)

HEROIC got both wins with Hoodwink, the most picked hero of the tournament: 29 matches played and a 55.17% winrate. Team Liquid's DreamLeague Season 23 drafts also included this hero. They even got their only win on this series with her, which means we may see the annoying squirrel get some nerfs on today's patch (please, Valve).

Is Team Liquid out of Riyadh Masters (EWC)?

Despite this disappointing result, Team Liquid still managed to achieve enough points to get a direct invite to Riyadh Masters. The Esports World Cup awards players that had good results not only during DreamLeague, but also on ESL One. This is the total points Team Liquid got according to the EPT Leaderboard:

Tournament
EPT Points
Prize money
DreamLeague S21
200
$30,000 USD
ESL One Kuala Lumpur 2023
3,000
$120,000 USD
DreamLeague S22
98
$15,000 USD
ESL One Birmingham 2024
2,240
$57,500 USD
DreamLeague S23
250
$30,000 USD

Team Liquid's DreamLeague Season 23 elimination may not be the only upset we see, as play offs are soon to start. Make sure to follow esports.gg coverage for more daily stories on this tournament!