(Banner image: Ubisoft/João Ferreira)
The most charged narrative throughout the group stage of the Sweden Major has been, without a doubt, North America’s struggles.
The narrative is absolutely earned — on the first day, NA only won one match out of eight — but there are some caveats to carve out. Specifically, Oxygen should be excluded from the narrative altogether.
Less than 24 hours before Oxygen was set to leave for the Major, Davide “FoxA” Bucci tested positive for COVID-19, leaving Oxygen without its IGL and Gabriel “LaXInG” Mirelez’s longtime duo. Anthony "HOP3Z" Nizzardo was forced to play in his place. To make matters worse, Leo “Kyno” Figueiredo and Evan “Yoggah” Nelson were forced to play from their rooms due to contract tracing rules since the players lived with FoxA.
“Going into this [Major], we were all prepped. We just bounced back from a season of unfortunate events, unfortunate sloppy plays … In Stage 3 we wanted to bounce back, show everyone that we were a dominant team, we were a good team,” said LaXInG in a Ubisoft-organized press conference. “It’s awful. We all put in tons of work to get here, and to see it all go out the window, it really does ruin the mental.”
LaXInG went on to explain how rough it was to lose all that preparation. FoxA is the team’s IGL, so not having that voice in the room was tough. But it was doubly tough losing the Fox-Lax connection. The pair have been playing on the same team since June 2018, and have taken their teams to Invitational semifinals, Pro League Finals, and won NAL 2021 Stage 1.
FoxA and LaXInG’s playstyles are incredibly similar. LaXInG describes it as unpredictable. Ungenerous descriptions call it “baiting.” Most just stick with “unorthodox.” Call it what you want — it works. LaXInG and FoxA simply make plays, somehow, some way.
“Not having that [IGL ability] obviously hurts us tremendously,” LaXInG said.
Losing anyone from a five-man roster the day before you travel for an event is bad, but it can be argued that losing your IGL hurts worse than any other piece of the puzzle.
Image courtesy João Ferreira/Ubisoft
Moreover, Kyno and Yoggah only know official Oxygen matches on LAN — NAL is played in a LAN environment. Each have played Challenger League matches from their bedrooms, but never specifically with Oxygen.
Each of these factors would be not ideal: Not having your entire team in one place, losing your IGL, and losing one of the region’s best playmakers. Combined, it’s effectively a death sentence.
Oxygen isn’t the only team missing a key piece to the puzzle in Sweden. Invictus Gaming was forced to play without Jeremy “HysteRiX” Tan because he ran out of leave from his national service requirements as a citizen of Singapore. Ellis “GiG” Hindle, the team’s coach, is also there in this place. Invictus is hobbled in a similar way, but at least the team had time to practice with their coach. Oxygen did not get time.
But it isn’t all doom and gloom from Oxygen. It isn’t all (legitimate) excuses.There are a couple advantages to playing with HOP3Z, LaXInG said. He’s able to remind the team about their opponents’ weaknesses, he keeps everyone calm and focused well. However, with less than 24 hour notice, the playing to a Major level is simply a bridge too far.
Said LaXInG:“For [HOP3Z], there’s nothing we can be mad at him for. It’s a crazy last-minute thing. Thankfully he was there so we could come out here and try to make as much money and place as well as we possibly can. But it is what it is at the end of the day.”