Fans have long been waiting for the rematch between OG and Evil Geniuses at TI9. Last year, OG got the better of EG and then continued on to win the entire TI8 tournament.
OG has been on a tear; they finished first in their group and absolutely destroyed Newbee in their previews match. EG, on the other hand, managed to do well enough in the group stage, and defeated tournament favorite Team Secret to advance in the Upper Bracket.
At the end though, it was OG going up 2-1 in a tightly contested series that sees Evil Geniuses dropping to the lower bracket to face the winner of Team Liquid vs Royal Never Give Up. Meanwhile, OG has secured a Top 3 finish alongside PSG.LGD.
Game one
Right at the start of game one, EG banned the Io knowing that they had no answer to OG’s carry IO. In response, OG picked Phantom Assassin and Invoker, while EG chose to go with the Terrorblade and Lina.
EG managed to win all of their lanes in the early phase, and Gustav “S4” Magnusson on Enchantress was able to farm his Hands of Midas just seven minutes into the game.
OG’s star mid-laner Topias “Topson” Taavitsainen was completely shut down all throughout the game, and EG continued to play a perfect game.
With Artour “Arteezy” Babaev equipped with an Aegis of the Immortal, OG decided to avoid team fights and conceded a full set of Barracks, 24 minutes into the game.
OG’s mistakes just kept piling up, and EG did not give them a chance to get back into the game. After another terrible team fight in the middle lane, EG charged into the Dire base and finished the game.
Game two
The second game saw OG taking away Enchantress from EG during the draft while picking up Faceless Void for Anathan “Ana” Pham. In response, the North American squad went with the Terrorblade again for Arteezy.
Unlike the last game, OG controlled the pace of the game this time around. They forced small skirmishes all over the map, and totally ruined Arteezy’s early game phase.
With EG not shying away from team fights, this gave Jesse “JerAx” Vainikka’s Earthshaker the perfect opportunity to land an amazing Echo Slam on Arteezy and Andreas “Cr1t-” Nielsen.
OG continued to pile on the pressure, and as EG was trying to retreat, Ana caught three enemy heroes with a perfectly placed Chronosphere. Right when the Chronosphere finished, Jerax followed up with a Fissure and Echo Slam that completely locked down EG.
Shortly after, OG pushed into the Dire base where they eliminated EG’s heroes and forced more buybacks. OG quickly regrouped after and finished the second game.
Game three
The third game saw the draft phrase turn into a chess match between both teams. Sebastien “Ceb” Debs was originally supposed to play Sand King, but because of EG’s Anti-mage pick, they were forced to shuffle heroes, giving Ceb the Enchantress again, while Jerax took Sand King.
OG managed to edge out EG in the early phase of game three and after they gained a small gold lead, they began to push the pace of the game.
While EG had no problems taking down OG’s support heroes, their inability to eliminate the enemy core heroes cost them dearly.
OG quickly pushed into the Dire base and there was nothing EG could do to repel them. The TI8 Champions took down multiple Dire structures and EG just stood by and watched.
Each time both teams clashed, OG kept getting the better of the exchanges. EG was caught hiding in the Dire base tree line by OG and while Arteezy tried to take down Topson’s Invoker, he was immediately killed off when his Black King Bar wore off. EG was forced to concede.
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