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Hope is a Cruel Thing: NA Valorant Challengers League Split 1 Week 2, Day 3 Recap
They dangled hope…then snatched it away.
The North American (NA) Challenger League 2023 is comprised of 12 teams competing over the course of 2 splits during the year. The first split, set to run from the 1st of Feb until the 17th of Mar, will culminate in attendance to the Mid-Season Invitational.
Turtle Troops upset FaZe on the first map before losing in a reverse sweep. BreakThru upset G2 on the first map before losing in a reverse sweep...waitttt. Day 3 of Week 2 continues to deliver with thrilling reversals and spellbinding series.
Here’s a complete cover of everything you might have missed from Week 2 of the 2023 Valorant NA Challengers League Split 1.
Current NA VCL Standing (Week 2)
Day Three Match Results
Turtle Troops vs FaZe Clan [1-2]
Killing turtles almost seems like a crime, yet FaZe made it look delicious as they closed out Maps 2 and 3 in style. Almost unanimously, they looked like the better team across the series, despite the best efforts of Turtle Troops to close the gap. Many times, throughout, Turtle’s plays were getting read and countered with ruthless efficiency by FaZe, who looked to post their first series win of the split.
However, some credit should be given to the efforts of Turtle Troops, especially Jack “Add3r” Hayashi, who still managed to post a respectable +6 48/42/4 scoreline across the series. In the same vein, Phat “supamen” Lee and Kevin “POISED” Ngo deserves no small praise for their performance across the three maps, consistently 1 and 2 on the scoreboard and in impact.
Strafe Player of the Series: FAZE supamen.
BreakThru vs G2 Esports [1-2]
A stellar first map for BreakThru that they unfortunately were not able to convert into a series win, as G2 snatched back victory in back-to-back Maps 2 and 3 wins. What looked like a dicey start to the series for G2, with Tyler “sym” Porter consistently finding entries on Haven attack side, leveraged into a solid first map win thanks to BreakThru’s team efforts, became a fruitless venture as G2 began ramping up.
Despite the competitive scoreline, Ascent always felt within G2’s grasp, as they shut down any attempts at taking B-site, thanks to Erik “penny” Penny and Shahzeb “ShahZaM” Khan especially. Furthermore, on Pearl, long-time Sentinel aficionado Michael “dapr” Gulino posted an incredible 22/12/2 scoreline, primarily during the Attack half.
Strafe Player of the Series: G2 dapr
Notable Stats for NA VCL Week 2
- Disguised has set a new record for the league, winning their series in just 1 hour and 9 minutes. The previous record was set the day before by The Guard at 1 hour and 10 minutes against OREsports.
- “koalanoob” holds the current record for First Kills secured, with 30 total and 9 first deaths.
- “bdog” currently holds the rating record with 248 ACS and 1.6 KD across 101 rounds played.
- “sym” has overtaken “OXY” in second place for First Kills, at 29 total. 18 of those, were posted during the BreakThru vs G2 match last night.
- The Guard “tex” currently sits at 40% headshot rate, the highest in the league currently. “Add3r” and “Drone” sit behind him in respective order.
The NA VCL will go on break for 2 weeks, until the week of the 27th. It will play out across four days now instead, to make up for the break. Read more on the format here.
Image credit: Knight Arena
