MLG Raleigh is near its end. After day 2, the group stage is completed and championship Sunday is about to start in a few hours, but before we plunge into the live action in the final day, let's see how the tournament progressed thus far.


GROUP A

The American Terran Trimaster was, to many people's surprise, the one to reach the group stage through the open tournament. He opened his pool play with a victory against InControl by defending both the immortal pressure and the void ray rush to walk out with a 2-0 victory. Unfortunately for him, however, he lost every single match after this one to end up with a 1-4 score. He is now to play Haypro in the Championship Lower bracket and if he is to win, he will have to face Idra.

SlayerS_Coca topped the group with the amazing 10-0 in sets. For the top spot in the group, he went against Naniwa and the zerg crushed with a sick timing attack. Moving his main army towards the natural while flying his overseers to the core of Naniwa's base, Coca managed to attack a protoss army, which did not see any reinforcements due to the massive contaminates back home.

HuK ended up third in the group, a spot determined only due to his previous record in Raleigh. It placed him just between Naniwa and Rain, the latter falling 1-2 to the Canadian protoss. This placement sends HuK to Round 6 of the champion ship bracket and there lies a possible team kill if Idra manages to defeat his opponent.


Coca (2nd from left to right) performed way better than his compatriots. A dangerous predator lies ahead of him, however!

GROUP B

The televised war between Zergs and Terrans in Group B began with Idra vs Noblesse. Greg won the first game in one of the most entertaining ZvTs in the pool play, ending a near 40-minute long game of constant terran aggression with fungal/brood lord combo that evaporated Noblesse's army. However, he threw this advantage away by doing a roach/ling all-in (a move which, as he later explained in an interview, was made due to his false anticipation of an early preigniter hellion pressure). Noblesse seized the series with a 11/11 bunker rush, getting him a nice 2-0 score in the group and putting Idra in an uncomfortable position.

Noblesse's biggest threat in the pool Bomber was also doing more than fine. He marked the new day at MLG with a victory against Haypro which secured him a 4-0 score. As the day progressed, that would mean that Bomber would have to face Noblesse for the top spot.

Three sets were needed to determine who is the better Korean. Finally, Bomber enforced his domination by breaking the standard TvT with a perfectly executed Banshee rush, supported with a high viking count. Bomber would enjoy seed into the championship upper bracket.

Sjow came third due to his earlier victory versus Idra. Sjow's place in the lower bracket guarantees him a game versus Rain, Incontrol or Machine, all three extremely strong competitors. If he is to win this, he will go up against his teammate Naniwa in yet another team kill at MLG tournaments.


Although smiling, EG's zergs Idra and Machine can not be overly satisfied with their performance.

GROUP C

Group C delivered what many fans were eager to see - SeleCT crushing faces. The Dignitas terran, who hasn't had an aspiring MLG performance since Dallas, came out strong to defeat both Trickster and Hero with 2-0. Special attention should be paid to the series with the Liquid protoss where SeleCT's relentless aggression in set 1 and the sleek defense and perfect EMPs in the second shot him up to take second in his group, just below DongRaeGu (who took first thanks to his earlier victory against the terran).

A bit down the ranks in pool C, Slush prevailed over Trickster with 2-0 to take third spot. In the championship bracket), the Canadian is placed between players like Sheth, Kiwikaki and Hero (to whom he already lost) so will have to upgrade his game a lot if he is to take a sweeter MLG placement.


DongRaeGu is smiling and with a top finish in Pool C - why wouldn't he. However, we are yet to see if he will keep the grin on after his upper bracket match versus Bomber.


GROUP D

In the fourth pool, EG's Puma went on a smiting spree, thrashing people around without much strain. He started with quick two victories against Moonan and Ret by showing why he has been a practice partner to Flash for so long. Puma then proceeded by prevailing over NaDa in a most entertaining TvT, definitely worth watching. After losing the first series due to overmaking air units, Nada equaled the score with much more stable army composition and hunted down Puma's thors with banshees and PDDs in a terrifyingly calm fashion. He tried to do that strat again the round 3 and even made it to BCs but those huge investments had put him in the base disadvantage. Although Puma's was losing a ton of stuff, his remacro capabilities were infinity times better.

Kiwikaki came second, dropping only a single series to Puma himself. He opened the group with a 2-0 victory against Nada in the first day and continued his streak until he had to face the EG monster in the decisive series. The protoss won the first set with a crushing colossus timing and almost dominated the second set as well, but Puma held with a clutch defense to equal the score. The series went into a nail-biting third set where Puma's 1-base 1/1/1 met Kiwi's immortal/phoenix/gateway composition. After moments of stalking at the center, Puma went on to engage and ultimately win the battle despite Kiwi's forcefields.


Can Puma pounce over Coca to reach the championship bracket final?

But enough narratives, let's see how the final results look in a table form!

Group A
Coca5-010-0
Naniwa3-27-5
HuK3-27-5
Rain3-27-5
Trimaster1-42-8
InControl0-50-10
Group B
Bomber5-010-3
Noblesse4-19-3
Sjow2-35-6
Idra2-35-7
Machine1-44-8
Haypro1-42-8


Group C
DongRaeGu4-18-3
SeleCT4-18-2
Slush2-35-6
Trickster2-35-6
Hero2-34-6
TLO1-43-9
Group D
Puma5-010-3
Kiwikaki4-19-4
Nada3-27-6
Sheth2-36-7
Ret1-46-8
Moonan0-50-10


What you should do now is tune in to MLG's streams and enjoy the final day of MLG Raleigh. The lower bracket games are already on the way and after those come the upper bracket semi finals: Bomber vs DongRaeGu and Coca vs Puma. By the end of the night we will have our Raleigh king!

Links
Flickr.com - Pictures from the event