RRQ Philippines completed its Cinderella run in the WCS Philippines with a stunning 4-1 victory over the fancied Fennel Adversity in the Grand Finals on Sunday, April 10.
Climbing its way from the lower bracket to the finals, RRQ showed steady resolve in the best-of-seven affair, overcoming a first game hiccup before securing the next four to emerge as the best Wild Rift team in the country and bag a $30,000 or roughly P1.5 million cash prize.
The team composed of Sean “Helios” Palisoc, Charles “Chaaz” Esguerra, Eric “Exosen” Gubatan, Marc “Marky” Ilagan, Mark Jentry “Maze” Galang and Keith “DevilJ” Gonzalez also booked a ticket to the WCS Championship playoffs .
Fennel, which finished second in the tournament, secured a play-in berth which will kick off April 23.
RRQ had a rough start to the final series as Fennel proved why it is considered as one of the premiere teams in the country.
Domino “Domeng” Magbanua spearheaded the attack as Fennel scored a four-man wipe of RRQ in a huge midlane collision at the 14-minute mark of the opener to score the first point of the series on an 8-4 tally and in just under 17 minutes of play.
RRQ then answered back in the next two games.
It scoring its own four-man wipe of Fennel in the 15-minute mark during a clash for the Ocean Dragon. RRQ then went on to secure the Baron Nashor in the ensuing play before posting another three-man pick-off on FLA to score the series equalizer, 9-3.
Game 3 was a nip-and-tuck affair as both squads played to its strengths. A crucial top lane split push from Devilj using his Fiora proved to be the difference as he managed to take down all of Fennel’s top lane turrets. That forced Fennel to react and split its team into two groups during clashes to which RRQ took advantage on to take the series lead, 8-4.
Sensing the championship within the grasp of its hands, RRQ showed no letup in the next two games as it thoroughly destroyed Fennel in Game 4, 24-11, before shattering any hopes of comebacks from Fennel with a lopsided 22-11 tally in the series clinching Game 5, putting a sweet end to an epic playoff run for RRQ.
It was first dropped to the lower bracket in the first round of the playoffs after losing to Team Secret 3-1. It battled for its tournament lives from there, defeating the likes of Sibol representatives Oasis Gaming (3-0), Grindsky Esports (3-1) and regular season top seed Team UNDRGRND (4-1) in the lower bracket finals.