North America - I was about to triumphantly state that no team died this round, until I found out aG.. or boatride.. or whatever, has most likely taken the plunge. I say "most likely" because no one's officially said anything yet (and it still says "pending" for the 20ID match), but I wouldn't hold my breath for a resurgance. Oh well, aG had a good run.

We have another glorious lineup of 3 matches and 3 or 4 (depending on boatride) teams on BYE due to FFs, so rather then rant and rave about the redikulus-ness of CEVO-P (remember, these teams *paid* to play.. and now they're getting half the matches promised), I'll just move on to the preds. I will, however, point out one benefit that this plague of clan-death has caused: the only real dominating team left is Pandemic, and the only real suck-ass team is Pure. Everyone else is kind of in the middle (even 20ID), which means every match is a must-win situation.. and hopefully leads to some kickass TF2.

Predictions:

High Self-Esteem v Wrecked - MOTW
scoff[REK] - no one gives us credit in anything we do
scoff[REK] - do we have to go undefeated in cevo to be recognized? (stolen from IRC)
Well scoff, here's your big chance. After totally dominating RA in a performance I sure as hell didn't see coming, REK has now officially impressed me enough to deem them somewhere between "not sucking" and "good" (hey, it's a start :P).

But in all seriousness, REK has definately been the darkhorse of this crippled CEVO-P season, keeping it close against good teams like aG and dominating others like last weeks beatdown on mach4 (18-6? Really, RA, you should be ashamed). If this was week 7 and the playoffs were in sight, I'd have no problem picking REK to face Pandemic in the finals. But there's still a few teams to beat yet.. like HSE.

I cannot stress how important this matchup is for both teams - the winner officially becomes a "good" team (along with 20ID), while the loser will swim in mediocrity for the remainder of the season, battling with other mid-level clans like RA, makeSHIFT, SIT.. well pretty much everyone other then Pure. Personally, I lost faith in HSE the day they lost to makeSHIFT, and while that might of been a granary-fluke, I just can't pick em this time.
REK [13:7] HSE

20ID v Pure Gaming
I made the first pred big because these next two are pretty straightforward - no matter what internal troubles 20ID might be having, all they gotta do is show up to beat Pure. However, I will give credit to Pure for sticking around despite the ass-whoopins they've taken (not to mention the beratement by me) - that shows character, regardless of your clan leaders constant doom-saying of TF2 in the comments :)
20ID [19:3] Pure

makeSHIFT v boatride
I have every reason to believe this match will not happen, and therefore have every reason to not write a full pred for it. Ha!
makeSHIFT [1:0] boatride

CEVO-P TF2 S1 Week 5-1 Scores
The lucky BYEs fall on RA, SIT, Pandemic and maybe makeSHIFT.



Scores/Preds for Week 5-1 are on next page.