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VCT LOCK//IN has finally kicked off, and the matches have been nothing short of exciting. The single elimination bracket has forced teams to bring out their trump cards early in the tournament. For LOCK//IN, thirty-two teams were invited, out of which thirty are the franchised teams, and two are the invited Chinese teams.
The Alpha bracket of LOCK//IN was concluded very recently. The two teams that have made it to the Playoffs stage are Brazil's superteam, LOUD, and the South Korean tyrants, DRX. LOUD only dropped one map in the three series, whereas DRX dropped three in theirs.
The Alpha bracket was a great talent showcase with some of the best moments in VCT history. The article below lists the five best moments in VCT LOCK//IN.
Note: This article is subjective and solely reflects the writer's opinions.
DRX trouncing Cloud9 and 4 other nail-biting moments from VCT LOCK//IN
1) NRG starts off LOCK//IN by winning the 9-3 curse
The first match of LOCK//IN was started by American esports organization NRG and EMEA's KOI. Both teams looked very strong, and fans expected a great matchup. However, on the first map, the Los Angeles-based team had a rough start as they saw themselves facing a 3-9 half on the defensive side of the first map, Icebox. The 3 rounds that they had were also very hard-fought, where sOm got a 5k to seal their third-round win.
Things looked like they were done for, but NRG seemed charged up after sOm's 5k. Brick by brick, NRG was able to pick themselves up. They started by winning the pistol and, by the end of the match, won by 13-11, meaning they only gave 2 rounds to KOI in the second half. At this point, people finally saw the potential in NRG's new roster. They went on to win 2-0 against KOI in the series.
2) Cloud9 presents a major upset by defeating Paper Rex
One of the most anticipated matches in the Alpha Bracket was Paper Rex vs. Cloud9. Paper Rex has built a solid reputation by being one of the best teams in VCT 2022. They finished in 2nd place in VCT Stage 2: Masters Copenhagen and proved that APAC (Asia-Pacific) teams had a lot to offer. They even decided to go with the same roster for VCT 2023.
On the other hand, Cloud9 was filled with superstar players like yay and the brilliant coach, mCe. Despite this, viewers expected Paper Rex to win, but Cloud9 had other plans. They pretty much dominated Paper Rex and were countering them well. Paper Rex even picked Lotus as their first map, but Cloud9 was ready. Cloud9 beat Paper Rex by 2-0 in the BO3 (Best of Three) series.
3) The rivalry continues
In the Alpha bracket, two teams had a history of persistent rivalry. They are NRG and LOUD. In VCT 2022, LOUD and OpTic Gaming battled it out multiple times. Both teams ended up winning one international event in 2022. In 2023, LOUD had 3 players from its core remaining, whereas NRG had 3 from the OpTic core.
NRG vs. LOUD was probably one of the best matchups in LOCK//IN. Both teams could win on each other's map picks, making it a 1-1. Fracture, the decider map was a whole different story. The two teams went back and forth by winning rounds with some of the most insane clutches possible. Finally, the home team, LOUD, won the map by 18-16, eliminating NRG and coming on top of the rivalry.
4) DRX destroys Cloud9 with Harbor on the decider map
DRX vs. Cloud9 was another amazing matchup in LOCK//IN. In a similar fashion to Paper Rex, DRX made a name for itself in VCT 2022 and had no changes to its roster. But after seeing the performance by Cloud9 in their previous matches, it was difficult to predict the winner. On the first map, Pearl, Cloud9 dominated DRX by beating them 13-3.
Fired up after their loss, DRX made the series even by winning out on Haven with a convincing 13-7. The deciding map was Icebox, and DRX decided to show up with Harbor. A very odd choice that was questionable and exciting at the same time. DRX destroyed Cloud9 and seemingly made Harbor very impactful throughout the match. Cloud9 could not adapt to these strategies and lost 2-13 to DRX.
5) Talon Esports beats Evil Geniuses by making a comeback on both maps
Talon Esports is one of the top teams from APAC as it contains the very successful X10/XERXIA core. The team has been performing well and has beaten some of the top teams in the world in previous years. On the other hand, Evil Geniuses had some amazing talent on their roster that showed promise.
In the first map, Haven, Talon Esports faced a 3-9 half against Evil Geniuses. Little by little, Talon Esports could mount rounds and outsmarted Evil Geniuses at every turn to beat them 13-11. The second map was similar, where Talon was again down in the first half by 4-8 but came back so much better and strung up many rounds to finally beat Evil Geniuses by 13-10 to win the B03 series by 2-0. They were one of the only two teams (the other was LOUD) to win the series without dropping a single map.
The Omega bracket in VCT LOCK//IN is about to begin soon. Multiple matches are exciting to watch and will make the crowd wild. Given how the Alpha bracket has panned out, viewers can expect upsets and entertainment.
