For the past week I’ve been trying to come up with the right words to describe what this first season of CEVO-Professional has been like, but the only word that comes to mind is interesting. The first season of CEVO-P has been pretty interesting. Throughout the season there have been many high and low points for various teams, mainly orchestrated by the unending roster changes that took place throughout the season. Indeed, there are only a handful of teams left in CEVO-P that has maintained the core of their roster throughout the season. These roster changes have caused a number of interesting match results with teams dominating one week and then falling apart the next. To complicate things even further there are at least 2-3 teams that died during the season and another 2-3 that quite obviously do not belong in CEVO-P next season as there are a number of amateur teams that can put up a better match.

Ignoring the gaping hole in CEVO-P teams at the moment, we can focus on playoffs. This season, playoffs will feature the top six teams in a double elimination tournament competing for the $2125.00 first place prize. Not bad huh? Fortunately, what this also means is that only “good” maps will be used during playoffs, which is good news for those pipeline and crossfire haters. Anyway, let’s take a look at the top six teams competing in playoffs and be sure to stay tuned to TeamPandemic.net for coverage throughout playoffs!

Team Pandemic – 1st Seed

Pandemic’s CEVO-P season can only be described as practically ideal. Sporting an impressive 13-2 overall record and the highest rounds won/lost ratio Pandemic has proven over and over they have what it takes to win. Despite their disappointing 4th place finish at NERV LAN, their online competitions seem unaffected as they have torn through CEVO-P and recently won TGL’s Last Stand Tournament. Despite excellent results, Pandemic decided to bring in David “skinz” Patnode towards the end of the regular season to strengthen their roster before the upcoming summer LAN season. One of the biggest factors contributing to Pandemic’s success is the amount of time they put in practicing for matches. There is an extremely noticeable difference when playing Pandemic if they practiced sufficiently or not. Fortunately, receiving the first seed has given them a bye in the first round of the upper bracket, giving them more time to practice CityStreets for their round two match. In what can only be described as bad luck, however, Vacant has been chosen as the map for upper bracket finals in round three, to decide who will secure at least second place and a spot in the playoffs. Most likely, Pandemic will be playing either EG or Nexus in the upper bracket finals. Pandemic narrowly defeated Nexus on Vacant in the TGL Last Stand Semi-Finals, however, the team got absolutely dominated by EG on Vacant during NERV, so it will be interesting to see how they will fair (assuming of course they make it to the upper bracket finals). Anything less than a top 3 finish would be a huge disappointment for this team.


Nexus Gaming – 2nd Seed
**GOTFRAG ROSTER UPDATE**

I really really like Nexus Gaming. Besides being a great team, they have something about them that makes you want to like them. One of the best thing about Nexus is they are extremely consistent. After making some big roster changes towards the beginning of the season, Nexus has been doing nothing but winning matches, being the only other team to tie Pandemic’s impressive 13-2 overall record. Their first lost came during week 1:1 when the team was vastly different from what it is today and their second loss came during week 7:1 where Guardians narrowly edged out the victory over them. Besides an impressive CEVO run, Nexus ended up finishing third in TGL’s Last Stand Tournament and let’s not forget their first place finish at NERV LAN. Another punctilio I really like about Nexus is the kind of talent on their roster. With the combination of Adam "deny" Phan and Michael "MichaelD" Wilbanks, they have two extremely talented Spec Ops players to storm bombsites. Backed by the recent addition of arguably one of the better players in North America, Josh "glada7or" Adams, Nexus has an excellent balance to match up against any team. Receiving the second seed grants them a bye during the first round of the upper bracket, but their second match won’t be easy as they will be facing the winner of EG and Guardians. Expect great games from Nexus throughout playoffs, despite whether they win or not, because this team always seems to make it close regardless of their opponent or map.


Frag Dominant – 3rd Seed

Let me start off by saying Frag Dominant is not a bad team, they really aren’t. They are one of the few teams who can compete in CEVO-P without getting completely rolled over all the time. With that being said, it is my personal opinion they aren’t a 3rd seed caliber team. Out of all the teams in CEVO-P, Frag Dominant has had more roster changes ranging from one or two player additions to an entire team change, partially in thanks to CEVO not enforcing the hijack rule this season to allow the game to pan out more. Because of all these roster changes, you practically see a completely new Frag Dominant team every other week, making their results somewhat unreliable as a real grasp of exactly how good this team is. The only team currently in playoffs they managed to beat during the regular season is MoB Gaming on Backlot. Fortunately for them, however, MoB is also the team they are scheduled to play during round one of the upper bracket, only this time on Strike. This is likely to be another close match and if they win they’ll be matched against Pandemic, a match that will probably go south for them. Despite this fact, however, Frag Dominant still has an chance of at least coming out with a 4th place finish this season providing they can top both MoB and Guardians.


Evil Geniuses – 4th Seed

EG has been confusing me recently, but maybe that’s because they spent so much time playing with the European ruleset. Post NERV LAN, I’d say EG is top two in North America, but I’m beginning to doubt them a bit. Granted, an 11-4 season record, second place NERV LAN finish, and third place finish at i33 isn’t anything to be crying about, but their last two weeks of matches of the regular season have me worried. First comes the 14-10 lost to MakeShift on Crash, which should have definitely gone in their favor. (Interestingly enough, however, MakeShift also played Pandemic on Crash that week and beat them 14-10.) Their next two matches during round 7 on Backlot against Focal and Sinister should have also been fairly comfortable wins, however, EG narrowly won 13-11 in both matches. Now, does this mean I think they will do poorly in playoffs? Definitely not. There is no question in my mind EG will finish top three, however, if they don’t buckle down and get the necessary practice in they will be looking closer to 3rd than 1st.


Guardians – 5th Seed

If you thought EG were confusing you haven’t seen Guardians. Round 6:2 Guardians get absolutely dominated 9-15 by MoB, but then during Round 7:1 narrowly defeat Nexus 13-11! Finishing with a 10-5 record isn’t bad; especially considering the top three or four teams in CEVO-P could beat each other on any given day. The real problem with Guardians is that on paper this team has the talent and experience to win CEVO-Professional, but they are severely lacking the determination. Random weeks of inactivity have hurt this team, making it hard to predict exactly how good they are. In addition, the increased practice time from EG, Nexus and Pandemic has left Guardians almost the odd fourth man out. Unfortunately their first match is against EG on Strike, which could surprisingly turn out to be a blessing in disguise if Guardians puts in the necessary practice time as EG was previously beaten by Pandemic 7-17 on Strike. On a individual player level, I feel both Brett "brett" Crick and Mike "Havax" Davis’ performances have been inconsistent. One match they are either on fire, but the next they are on the bottom of the scoreboard. Overall, Guardians need to get organized and put in the necessary practice time instead of relying on pure skill. If they do this, I can guarantee you we’ll see the Guardians that won the CEVO Finish the Fight Tournament.


MoB Gaming – 6th Seed

I almost feel bad for MoB in playoffs. Being the last seed is never easy, but the fact they are the last seed in a six team bracket and most people think almost every other team competing in playoffs is better is better than them, just makes it that much harder. On and individual player level, MoB has undergone a number of changes with only Matt “Chimpae” Gomez and Mike “tyrant” Bacchus being the only remaining players from the original ExitWounds/MoB team we saw at NERV LAN. Despite bringing in the three remaining players on Phoenix, and then adding Zach "tm" Miller towards the end of the season, MoB still has some serious roster issues, the biggest of which, however, is ironing out a solid starting five. In MoB’s case, using a 6 man rotating starting roster is not a good option. Besides complicating things for the players that consistently get rotated out, it puts an extra strain on the full time starters to understand how each individual plays on each map. In my personal opinion, I feel the best starting five MoB can field is the three Pheonix starters, Miller, and Bacchus. Although this leaves Gomez on the bench after he had originally brought the team together and organized their sponsorship, it is definitely in the best interest of the team. If MoB can take those starting five and get some serious practice in, they can be the dark horses to turn some heads during playoffs. Otherwise, I’m seeing a 5th/6th place finish from MoB.