With a disappointing finish at Digitallife last weekend, 3D entered the Newegg LANFest with something to prove. With the rule set in play at Digitallife following the traditional competitive format, most of the CGS teams in attendance struggled. The exception, compLexity, seemed to welcome the $800 start money, as their deagle armor tactic on save rounds in unrivaled.

"I think the different format had a lot to do with our problems at Digitallife. With max rounds at 15, and start money at 800, we struggled. When you have been practicing for about a year with a certain format, it is pretty hard to switch back. Here, we are much more comfortable." - Kyle "ksharp" Miller

While 3D had a pretty easy group, all of the delays associated with the on-site scheduling ending merely an hour before things were supposed to start kept them here yesterday until the twilight hours. Ultimately finishing their matches at around 2 A.M. PST, 3D was the second to last group to leave. With teams having to report at 10 A.M., this did not give the later groups much time for sleep.

"Coming in cold and tired is never a good thing, especially when you are starting T side on nuke. Chicago played well, and capitalized on our mistakes." - Andy Rector

After getting ran over 13-1 in their first round match against the Chicago Chimera, it looked as if 3D had nothing left in the tank. Thoughts of having two bad tournaments in a row started to creep into their heads.

"I think the disappointing finish at Digitallife was in all of our heads after the loss to Chicago. We just talked it over as a team and put it out of our minds." - Andy Rector

The next match would be crucial for 3D. A loss here, and their tournament life would be over. Luckily, they were paired off against arguably the weakest of the double elimination competitors; the pug team 1shot.

After a quick and easy win over 1shot, 3D would receive a true test in the next round against the Carolina Core. Miller had a huge match for 3D, simply dominating most of the players he encountered. The ksharp bandwagon had received a new set of tires.

"I changed my mouse pad right before the Dust2 match. From then on everything felt good. I had a lot of confidence and think I was hitting most of my shots. I was able to hold down my spot effectively. The rest of the team was also playing great." - Kyle "ksharp" Miller

Next up for 3D was Pandemic, the team that knocked them out in New York. Fortunately for 3D, they would end up facing off on Inferno this time around. Starting off on offense, 3D looked like they were in control, but with some poor post plant setups, they lost a lot of rounds which they probably shouldn't have. Once the teams switched sides was a whole new story though, as 3D simply dominated with some strong site holds.

"T side went well; we were able to take over sites pretty easily. But just like at digitallife, we struggled to hold them once we had the bomb down. CT side we just locked it down. Sal and Jimmy did a great job at holding B. I think we held them to only one round in the half." - Andy Rector

3D found themselves facing off against their rivals, the LA compLexity. Finding themselves in a do or die position against the tournament favorites on their worst map, 3D needed all of their players to be at the top of their game. With ksharp being forced to rotate outside and leave rector alone in ramp, coL scraped together two rounds hitting ramp.

While 3D could see the finish line, coL kept them from getting there, with both fRoD and Zet picking up their games. 3D didn't even get on board until the 6th round. By that time, the match was too far out of their control to bring it back.

"Nuke is one of our weaker maps. I mean we had that 13-1 loss on it. After that loss, we made some improvements on it. During the match with coL, we had a few chances where we had numbers on them and just blew it. Some little mistakes ended up costing us the match." - Kyle "ksharp" Miller

"In the consolation match, we made a few key mistakes on CT side. One that really stands out in my mind is the round that they were able to get lower, and plant before we even knew. They threw some good flashes upper, and went down the vents. From there, they got the bomb down and got in great spots to stop our retake." - Andy Rector

While 3D only finished one place above their Digitallife performance, it can be seen as a dramatic improvement. With all of the CGS teams being in attendance, as well as all of the other top Source teams, this event was much tougher.

"All in all, we are fairly happy that we pulled it together and at least got third." - Andy Rector