New York Excelsior upset Philadelphia Fusion in a 3-1 win
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New York Excelsior upset Philadelphia Fusion
Screenshot by Michael Czarnowski
Category:
Overwatch

New York Excelsior upset Philadelphia Fusion in a 3-1 win

The Excelsior start to climb as the Fusion start to fall
Image of Michael Czar
Michael Czar
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Published: May 22, 2021 02:39 pm

The New York Excelsior upset the Philadelphia Fusion, beating them 3-1 and are now only the second team to beat the Fusion. After all the trash talk brought up by these teams, the underdog NYXL managed to defeat the Fusion. Sticking to a consistent roster, New York played more comfortably with the hero pool changes than the Fusion. With this win, the NYXL have their second win of the season and a set path to make it to the June Joust tournament.

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Match Recap

Going into this match, the Fusion were undefeated in the regular season and the NYXL had only one win to their name. However, with the hero pool changes removing Tracer, Sombra, Reinhardt and Zenyatta, fans worried how the NYXL could adapt. Their best player, and former league MVP Bang “JJoNak” Sung-hyeon, played Zenyatta many times in the May Melee. The Fusion, on the other hand, would lose some of their players’ favorite heroes, but have shown the ability to adapt and succeed. That’s why this match, hypothetically, should’ve been a win for the Fusion.

The first map proved that wrong. On Lijang Tower, the NYXL won the map off of their read of the new metas. They made changes faster and better than the Fusion, earning the map in a back-and-forth win. New York then improved on what they did right in the second map. They pushed the entirety of Numbani and proceeded to full hold the Philadelphia Fusion on their attack. The NYXL went up 2-0 on the Fusion and were on match point.

On the third map, the Fusion started to show signs of life, winning a close Rialto map by pushing farther than the NYXL. Their changes clearly worked better on Rialto than the previous maps. They made the first step on the path to victory, but needed to win two more to achieve victory. In the final map of Volskaya, the Excelsior played what they were best at and showed their proficiency in the meta once again. They capped both points on their attack and fully held the Fusion again to get the win.

Both teams on different paths

With this win, the NYXL look to improve and make it to the June Joust tournament. The same can be said for the Fusion, but they looked nowhere near as powerful as they did in the May Melee meta. The Philadelphia Fusion seem to still be in the process of learning how to play this meta, while New York understood it more in this upset. This is an early game to judge both teams on. Fans will have to wait and see for their next two games to find out if these teams will be in the June Joust tournament.

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Author
Image of Michael Czar
Michael Czar
Polish-Canadian game enthusiast. I've been entrenched in gaming for as long as I can remember, with my first game being Pokemon Yellow and my most played games being Borderlands 2 and Overwatch. I have a degree in Film Studies, but writing about esports just makes my job all the better.
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