Sentinels Suffer Defeat Against OpTic in NA VCT Stage Two
In Saturday’s NA VCT Stage Two matches, Sentinels faced a tough challenge against the 2022 Masters Reykjavík champions OpTic. With the team struggling to advance out of groups, Sentinels fans were hoping for a win.
Unfortunately, just two hours before the scheduled start time, Sentinels made an announcement. Rawkus and Dani would be stepping in as emergency roster substitutes. Despite their efforts, the team lost to OpTic 2-0, leaving them with an overall record of 0-3 in the group stage.
“It feels like everything that could go wrong is going wrong for them right now,” caster Smix mentioned during the broadcast.
Map One: Fracture
The match started on OpTic’s map pick, Fracture. OpTic stuck with a standard composition, making a single change by moving yay onto Chamber. On the other hand, Sentinels had to adapt their roles due to the last-minute roster changes. Kanpeki took on the duelist role, reminiscent of Neon’s earlier days when he was considered one of the best players on the agent in NA. Despite some impressive plays from the coach Rawkus (who is also currently battling COVID) and Kanpeki’s expertise on Neon, Sentinels lost the map 13-5.
Map Two: Bind
Following OpTic’s dominant performance on the first map, the teams moved to Sentinels’ map pick, Bind. The map began with a pistol round that saw Marved winning a knife fight against dapr.
This unconventional pistol round win was one of the only two rounds Sentinels managed to secure in the first half.
Trailing 10-2, Sentinels made an impressive comeback in the second half. They won six rounds on defense, forcing OpTic to call for a timeout. After the break, OpTic returned with a methodical approach to their attack, and yay sealed the victory for them. With the last round going in favor of OpTic, they secured the map and the match with a final score of 13-8.
Despite the defeat, there is still hope for Sentinels. They are not yet mathematically eliminated from advancing out of the group stage. If they can win their next two games against FaZe Clan and Cloud9, as long as C9 loses to FaZe on Sunday, Sentinels still have a chance to advance. Hopefully, with their main roster back, the team will have an opportunity to redeem themselves next week.
The next match for Sentinels is scheduled for Jun. 4 at 3pm CT against FaZe.
