Day 1 of The Big House 6 came to a close with Southern California repeating as the "Super Smash Bros. Melee" regional crews champion. SoCal's players performed well at different moments, but no one shined brighter than Tempo Storm's Johnny "s2j" Kim.
In Round 1 against Maryland/Virginia, he started as the lead player and took out eight stocks -- two players' worth out of five players for each crew -- before losing to Kashan "Chillindude" Kahn. The lead snowballed into an easy win for SoCal.
In a hotly contested battle with Europe in semifinals, SoCal's McCain "MacD" LaVelle created a small lead for s2j going into the last match of the crew battle. In the daunting anchor position, s2j needed to close out the crew battle by fighting William "Leffen" Hjelte, who is considered one of the six best players in the world. Even with a one stock advantage, s2j confessed, "I tried to stay as calm as possible in this nerve-racking situation, but it was difficult."
The lead disappeared after Leffen executed a death combo to tie the stock count. In a final stock situation, s2j was nervous, but let his experience carry through. "After Leffen did a big combo, I went back to what works for me in practice. He didn't play well, and I found some openings to win," he said.
After a narrow win over Europe, SoCal would play Florida in finals. Florida pulled an early lead as Jason "Mew2King" Zimmerman still had one stock left after defeating Joseph "Mango" Marquez. The team called upon the stylish Captain Falcon main once again and s2j delivered. He took Mew2King's last stock on an inadvertent mistake, and Florida decided to match s2j with their own Captain Falcon, Justin "Wizzrobe" Hallett.
Historically, Wizzrobe and s2j have had close sets, but s2j felt that he had the upper hand this time around. He explained, "I had a good read on Wizzy. Even when I made mistakes, I felt confident and it paid off when it mattered most." The duel went neck and neck, but s2j had the last laugh as he pulled a "Johnny stock" -- a technique where he takes an opponent from no damage to death with just one combo -- to finish Wizzrobe and take the lead for SoCal.
Falling behind, Florida sent Colin "Colbol" Green to fight s2j, but made a crucial mistake in choosing Yoshi's Story as the counter-pick stage. "When they picked Yoshi's Story, I felt relieved. Normally that's a bad Falcon stage, but I love it. Also, Marth is one of my favorite players to play against. I felt very comfortable," s2j explained.
With only one stock remaining, s2j took three of Colbol's stocks and shut down Florida's chance to win; he had taken out eight stocks total from the opposing crew. Weston "Westballz" Dennis came in after to clean out Colbol's last stock and with the crew battles for SoCal for a second year in a row.
Throughout each crew battle, s2j built leads, overcame team deficits and anchored the team in crucial moments. Melee singles continues through the weekend at The Big House 6, and s2j's performance in crews may have given him a huge confidence boost for the rest of the event.