The first North American Ignition Series, Valorant Tournament, brought together by T1 and Nerd Street Gamers came to an end last night with Team Solo Mid winning the grand finals and taking away $25,000. With the total pool prize of $50,000, T1 received $15,000 in second place, and in third and fourth place, Immortals and FaZe Clan got $5,000 each.
TSM played against T1 in the grand finals and beat them 3-0. The team’s roster consists of players who are former Counter-Strike: Global Offensive pros. They started the competition in Group B, alongside Immortals, Charlotte Phoenix, and Spot Up. TSM beat all three teams in the group stages with an impressive +35 round difference to move on to the double-elimination knockout bracket.
In the quarterfinals, the team faced off against Together We Are Terrific, who beat Cloud9 in the group stage. Together We Are Terrific was the first team to beat TSM in a round, but TSM took the victory in the best of three series.
The semifinals match was against FaZe Clan, who knocked out 100 Thieves. TSM was able to knock them out 2-0 and to secure their spot to the grand finals. TSM’s Matt “Wardell” Yu was the MVP of the game.
Team Solo Mid
The full roster of the team:
– James “hazed” Cobb
– Taylor “drone” Johnson
– Matthew “WARDELL” Yu
– Yassine “Subroza” Taoufik
– Stephen “reltuC” Cutler
After the victory, TSM became crowned as the best team in North America. Not only are they now officially the best team, but each individual was recognized as a great player.
The team grinded it out even during the closed beta phase and won multiple titles along the way. Several players on the team were offered individual spots from bigger tier-one organizations, but all of them refused, believing that their team of five would achieve great accomplishments.
TSM’s MVP Wardell is one of the most talented Valorant players and proved it throughout the tournament. Wardell was unstoppable from long range and picked off any opponent on-site, even through smoke and obstructions. Many believe he can be the face of Valorant, like how Faker is the face of League of Legends, and he has a lot more to show as this is only the beginning.
Another player from the team who showed leadership attributes to push the team toward success is Taylor “Drone” Johnson. Drone was the cause of their main strength, which is to accelerate the pace of the game.
Ignition Series
The Ignition Series is a worldwide series aimed at developing competitive Valorant. The founders of Valorant hoped to bring together top players and teams to fight against each other in diverse formats and look for more people with talent to play the game from the series.
The first Ignition Series happened in Europe, the European G2 eSports event. Team Nordics beat team Benelux to be the champions of Valorant in the European server.
Japan’s biggest eSports event, RAGE, hosted the Ignition Series in Japan. North Africa hosted the tournament on the same date as North America, and the GGTech Valorant invitational will feature Latin American teams in July.
The Valorant Pacific will be held by Cyber Games Arena and occur in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines, and Thailand.
One thing that fans were not satisfied with was the spectator mode. Currently, Valorant spectator mode consists of the most basic functions, with a free camera from one player’s point of view.
Product owner on the personalization team for Riot Games, Anna Donlon posted on Twitter, “Our spectator features as they existed at launch were not designed for broadcast and are by no means eSports ready. We are working to evolve these things in advance of any official kick-off of our game as an eSport.”
