Local team Grayhound stunned last year’s champions SK Gaming at IEM Sydney with a shock upset win, eliminating them from the $250,000 tournament.
After both teams had fallen to the lower bracket, with SK suffering their first surprise defeat to Chinese side TyLoo, and Grayhound beaten handedly by Cloud9, the match looked to be an easy one for the majority Brazilian SK lineup.
Of course SK have recently acquired former Cloud9 player Jake “Stewie2K” Yip, replacing Epitácio “TACO” De Melo, and so can perhaps be forgiven for still finding their feet as a roster.
However, nothing could have predicted that likely the biggest underdogs of the tournament, local team Grayhound, would be the ones to send SK home.
The first map, Grayhound’s pick Mirage, was a back and forth affair, and just SK looked like they were back in control, the Australian side miraculously rallied eight straight rounds to take a 14-12 lead, eventually closing it out 16-13.
SK didn’t slip up on their own map pick, Cache, and despite a spirited effort from Grayhound, they looked comfortable in the end and took it to a third map with a 16-11 win.
The third map, Overpass, is where things got really crazy, as the teams traded rounds and Grayhound very much looked SK’s equal throughout. With the upper hand in the economy, Grayhound took it 16-11, and BigDickStacy and co. sent SK packing.
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The upset came after possibly one of the funniest live interviews in esports, as Ollie “Dickstacy” Tierney told the crowd that the team were feeling “thick and pumped” and ready to go in “nice and hard”.
Dickstacy and the rest of the Grayhound squad will now have the opportunity to cause another big upset as they take on FaZe Clan in the next round.
FaZe were taken down by Renegades in the upper bracket, despite star AWP player Ladislav “GuardiaN” Kovács going +26 kills and deaths over the three maps.
SK on the other hand will need to go back to the drawing board and resolve the issues which the new roster with Stewie2K is facing, as little is going right for them currently.