Last week, the Overwatch League, or OWL, opened to raring plays from every team involved. There were plenty of outstanding players and plays, alongside lots of great community jokes thanks to the casters of each game.
Out of the 14 matches played in the opening week there were two major upsets, shocking OWL fans everywhere. Because the upsets were so major, nobody even gave the underdog teams a chance to win and that’s why they were so astonishing.
These two important matches came alongside plenty of other interesting gameplay, with strong performances from the Toronto Defiant after they signed three new players and a new coach right before the season started. The Florida Mayhem snatched an undefeated opening weekend for themselves, and the Philadelphia Fusion took their first two games, even with the loss of some of their stronger players recently.
While the week went well for all these teams, it went even better for the Chengdu Hunters, a low-ranking team within the league. They managed to take their match against the Shanghai Dragons with a clean 3-0 sweep.
What makes this win especially significant for the Hunters is that the Shanghai Dragons have won multiple major tournaments over the last year, including the OWL Countdown Cup 2020 and the NetEase Esports X Tournament.
With the Chengdu Hunters never taking above 3rd place in any tournament, with their consistent results placing them near 8th, this upset shows the start of a potentially incredible season for them.
Another team that’s had a great week is the Houston Outlaws. With a track record that’s consistently worse than the Hunters, placing 10th or worse in all but two tournaments they attended in the last two years, they managed to take the win in a major match against the San Francisco Shock, a top competitor in OWL, and for no small reason.
The Shock has won more than half of their tournaments in the last two years, and never placed below fourth, even in the most competitive tournaments. For the Houston Outlaws, taking the match against The Shock, 3-2, is such a massive upset that it’s put them in the spotlight for the week.
With all these big upsets and all the excitement, you might expect last week would have been the highlight of the tournament, but there’s so much left to the competition that there could be some more exciting gameplay coming our way.
Not only does the league’s season start in late April, but it’s also separated into five different events. The May Melee, the June Joust, the Summer Showdown, the Countdown Cup, then the playoffs and grand finals. Right now, the league is only in the May Melee and there are 18 weeks left in the season.
However, with stakes not being very high in the competition right now, there’s less drive for many teams to give their all during every match because it likely won’t affect the outcome of the tournament. There’s still so much room for incredible plays, crazy upsets and competition defining moments all in the next 18 weeks.
All these games can be watched for free on the official OWL YouTube channel, and the schedule can be found on the league’s website. It’s a great idea to watch at least some of the games in the coming weeks because they’re exciting, and it’s a great opportunity to expand your horizons to other, more unconventional sports.
Dylan Shepler can be reached at [email protected]