Yet another week of the North American ESL Pro League went by with little movement in the standings. Despite some setbacks, SK Gaming is still at the top, but Cloud9 and Team Liquid have both taken strides to close the gap between the top three. With three weeks yet to play, intrigue is beginning to develop in the upper echelons of the league.
After playing against some formidable competition in the past couple of weeks, SK continues to show its vulnerabilities. Its week got under way with two games against Cloud9, in a series that saw the team up at the half actually lose the game in the end.
Cloud9 started Game 1 on Inferno with a 10-5 halftime lead before SK mounted an incredible second-half comeback to take the map. In Game 2 on Cache, SK had a 9-6 lead at the half before C9 nearly ran the table in the second half for a 16-10 win.
SK closed out the week against Team Liquid in another close series. Playing on Mirage in the first game, SK started out with a 10-5 lead after the first half. This time, the first-half lead stuck. Moving over to Inferno for the second game, Liquid owned a 10-5 lead at the half and had to fight tooth-and-nail to stop SK from coming back in the second half. It took a close Round 30 to lock up the map and split the series.
C9 and Liquid both played one other series during the week outside of its meeting with SK Gaming. C9 opened up Week 7 play with a 2-0 sweep over The Foundation on Tuesday. In both games, C9 was down at the half and had to mount sizable second-half comebacks in order to get the win. Nevertheless, it picked up 16-14 and 16-12 wins, respectively, to end the week with a 3-1 record.
Liquid followed a similar script in two games against OpTic Gaming on Wednesday. It was down 10-5 at the half on Nuke before coming back for a 16-13 win and was then down 9-6 at the half on Cobblestone before going 10-5 in the second half for a close 16-14 win. The resilient performances left Liquid with an identical 3-1 with its rival, Cloud9, on the week.
NRG Esports had the week off, so Immortals and Luminosity Gaming had an opportunity to gain some ground and break into the top five. Immortals took two very lopsided wins over The Foundation on Wednesday by scores of 16-2 and 16-5, respectively, to propel itself into the fourth spot with 39 points.
Luminosity also seized the opportunity with a 2-0 series of its own, albeit in a much closer showing than Immortals. LG went against Rush and took a close 16-14 win on Inferno before finding its stride on Cobblestone with a 16-8 win that saw it go 9-0 in the second half. The wins put LG in a tie with NRG for that fifth spot, with both teams having 33 points.
Although the top spots didn't change a whole lot, there is a lot less room for error up in the top of the standings after seven weeks of play. SK (48 points), Cloud9 (45 points), Liquid (42 points) and Immortals (39 points) are only separated by three points per position, which means that every game is going to mean a bit more from here on out. The top three are all off in Week 8, which sets up an exciting finish in the final two weeks of the season.