In an exciting back-and-forth series on Sunday evening, European giants Team Secret took the victory against Evil Geniuses to secure the title in their first major tournament appearance of the season.
Secret had been impressive throughout, dominating the group stage only dropping one game throughout and continuing that dominance through the upper bracket beating teams such as Fnatic, Alliance, and Vici Gaming before coming up against their old enemy EG in the grand finals that would go all the way and then some.
EG had a much harder route to the grand finals. Having been beaten by Vici in the second round of the upper bracket, the North American roster had to enter the lower bracket in round four, meaning they would need to play two additional sets of games just to get to play against Secret for a chance at the championship. They would knock out Invictus Gaming, Alliance, and then finally would win their rematch against Vici in the lower bracket final to qualify for the grand final.
It was EG who would take game one of the best of five series, with the entire EG squad only having seven deaths between them in a 45-minute long game, giving the game the feeling of a stomp despite Secret trying to hold on as long as they could. Abed ‘Abed’ Yusop on his Templar Assassin stood out as one of the best performers; however, no one on the NA side had a bad game. In game two, it was the opposite story, with Secret taking a dominant early lead thanks to their cheese Meepo pick and securing the win in a similar fashion, racking up only 11 deaths on their side in a game of the same length as the previous.
Game three was a different story, with both teams fighting it out in what was an even game for a long period however on the back of Artour ‘Arteezy’ Babaev’s signature Naga Siren and an impressive performance once again from Abed, this time on Storm Spirit, EG were able to take game three and tournament point for themselves. Game four ended up falling back into old ways however, with Team Secret destroying EG in a one-sided game that lasted only 36 minutes off the back of Michał ‘Nisha’ Jankowski’s deathless Leshrac mid and Lasse ‘Matumbaman’ Urpalainen taking the mid-game by the scruff of the neck with his Morphling, taking away the tournament point of EG and making it a best of one for the trophy.
So with the score balanced at 2-2, it came down to the fifth and final game of the series and the game was a similar story to the rest of the series, with Team Secret winning in convincing fashion thanks to Matumbaman once again having a fantastic game as well as Yazied ‘YapzOr’ Jaradat who took over the early game on his roaming Tiny. This meant that Secret took the series and became the Dreamleague Major champions, not dropping a single series the entire tournament.
In the DPC circuit standings, TNC Predator sits at the top of the table after winning the first major and finishing in 7th-8th place in this event, while champions Team Secret jump up to third place, just below Vici Gaming who finished in 3rd place and above EG who sit in 4th. The third major of the season will be ESL One Los Angeles in March, with qualifier dates soon to be announced.
WE MADE IT! 🏆
WE ARE YOUR DREAMLEAGUE SEASON 13 CHAMPIONS!#SecretDota #DHDL13 pic.twitter.com/VoIwu7v0Z4
— Team Secret (@teamsecret) January 26, 2020
