Team 3D
Kyle “ksharp” Miller
Michael “method” So
Salvatore “volcano” Garozzo
Andrew “rectoor” Rector
Jimmy Lin

Despite their wealth of experience, 3D is coming into this Invitational as a bit of an underdog. They have the skills necessary to compete with any team out there, but they seem to be lacking the spark that makes great teams excel. While they haven't yet found that killer instinct, it could be just around the corner and often it comes about suddenly and unexpectedly (ie. verGe at NewEgg). Lately, this team has been on a rampage and have not lost a match since round three of CEVO-P. After being blown out by coL early in the CEVO-Professional season, 3D will definitely be looking for revenge. Lin commented on the previous and upcoming coL matches saying: "Against coL I have no excuse we simply got blown out. Complexity played a terrific game and they have been adjusting well, their record shows it. Now I would say we are 200% more prepared. When we played them it was on one of CEVO's new maps de_losttemple. The map was fairly new to us so it was hard to come up with new tactics. Since the Intel Tournament is just the regular rotation I think we should be fine."

Statistically, Method and Ksharp have been leading the team by a large margin, with Method getting over 100 frags offensively this season and Ksharp getting a whopping 110 defensively. A noticeable trend in 3D's closer wins against tough opponents is the fact that Volcano really stepped up and got kills; in fact, he was the top fragger in each of their close wins. Another trend is that in all of the close matches 3D has had this season, Lin has been their least proficient fragger, whereas in all of their blowout wins, Lin has had one of the top scores. So while Ksharp and Method are consistently fragging, Volcano and Lin need to really step up in this tournament and start playing with more consistency. 3D has a shot at this tournament because like Lin said, they are familiar with these maps. Overall they averaged 19 rounds on nuke and dust2 compared to 17 on other maps this season.

Hyper!
Jacob “Nightfall” Stanton
Cory “badapples” Branagan
Sean “tuned” Portis
Jon “shredder” Hayes
Joseph Foerster

Hyper! has to be a favorite to make it to the finals, but they have been overshadowed by coL ever since the 1.6 switchover. When asked about the matter long standing Hyper! member Foerster had this to say: "I think we get respect from most people, despite the online accusations people love to throw around. Honestly though, we don't really care we'll just keep going about our business winning and whatever people think of us is up to them". They remain undefeated in CEVO and have been just rolling through the competition; they currently average over twenty two rounds per match. Statistically, this team is very well rounded with every player getting their fair share of frags. One stand out is clearly evident however, badapples has 200 frags this season with just about 100 both offensively and defensively and is sitting at a positive 93 K/D.

Under the leadership of Nightfall, this team has excelled and grown by leaps and bounds. Foerster commented on Nightfall saying: "Nightfall has helped us to become more coordinated and communicate better. It's been a long standing trend in Hyper that we don't communicate very well and it affects our play. Now with Jake it's not an option and its what we needed to take us over the top." In previous seasons, we saw Hyper! win or lose rounds based purely off of their ability to out pick opponents. Often we would see their players push too far or get too aggressive and isolate themselves from the rest of the team, which allowed them to get picked or severely damaged. With this newly found coordination, Hyper! is a team to be reckoned with.

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