Rocket League Championship Series Bracket
Seeds 1 and 2 are placed into the Upper Bracket while seeds 3 and 4 are placed into the Lower Bracket. The eight teams that survive qualify for the final single-elimination bracket on Day 3. Winner of the single-elimination bracket wins the Regional Event. The Majors will once again be online and regional. That means each region will have its own Major. Rocket League Championship Series (RLCS) X is a full evolution of Rocket League Esports. The RLCS X Season has three Splits (Fall, Winter, and Spring), each with its own distinct format. It's more matches, more action, and more hype. Sign up today for your chance to play against the best teams on the planet. Rogue took home a hard-fought win in a volatile grand final of the North American Rocket League Championship Series (RLCS) Season X Winter Regional 3. Rogue faced NRG in the grand final after they came from the upper bracket. After high-paced games Rogue was forced into a bracket reset when NRG won the final game 3-1.
LONDON -- The Team Dignitas Rocket League walked into the interview room looking thoroughly exhausted.
Who could blame them? A loser's bracket run that lasted all day saw the defending champions come back to reset the bracket and break the hearts of North America with a Rocket League Championship Series title-claiming victory against NRG Esports. The victory avenged an upper-bracket loss to NRG and gave the Dignitas roster another RLCS title.
The Copper Box Arena in London went nuts when Dignitas took the lead with four seconds left. Just six mere second later, though, NRG fired back with a tying goal of its own in extra time.
In the end, though, the Europeans took home the top prize and sent London into a raucous applause.
ESPN: What was the difference between your upper-bracket matchup vs. NRG, and what changed in the grand finals?
Jos 'ViolentPanda' van Meurs: To be honest, we just weren't prepared for them, and we had a bad day. We could have done better that day. So we just put our minds straight and went into the next day and slowly got better and got to the final and beat them.
Courant 'Kaydop' Alexandre: To be honest, the first day I didn't play very well, and I think it was a big deal.
ESPN: How big of an impact did nerves play for you, especially in that last game?
ViolentPanda: For me personally, not much. I was happy with second place. Of course first place is better, but I was happy with second. I was just going into the match with a straight face: If we lose, it's fine. If we win, even better. I wasn't nervous at all.
Pierre 'Turbopolsa' Silfver: I wasn't nervous at all. We've been at this stage so many times, so I've gotten used to it. The crowd helps. It's a great atmosphere out there.
ViolentPanda: It's a great example of the crowd helping. When we lost in ELEAGUE, the crowd was really against us and got to us. The crowd behind us now was amazing.
ESPN: Walk me through the last 25 second of Game 7. You go up one goal, then it gets tied with a zero-second goal and then you win it in overtime.
ViolentPanda: I tried to keep my teammates as motivated as possible. Turbo tends to lean back and say 's---, my fault' but I try to keep them up and keep them in the game. Just try to keep it positive.
Turbopolsa: Well I literally own goaled. So.
ESPN: Turbo, you've won [RLCS] three times now, and you've had the experience. How long do you think this will take to set in?
Turbopolsa: Just like the first RLCS win we had, we will just keep up with our routines and keep with what we usually do. If we stop what we usually do, we will fall apart.
With the 15 teams in the Rocket League Championship Series locked in, it's time to predict how each will stack up in their regions. Europe? Check. North America? Check.
Here's our predictions for the six-week RLCS season beginning this Saturday.
North America
1. G2 Esports
G2 Esports comes in with its best roster to date, one that finally lives up to the skill of captain Cameron 'Kronovi' Bills. If G2 plays to its potential skill level and Dillon 'Rizzo' Rizzo can keep his form going, it should comfortably finish with the top spot in North America.
2. NRG Esports
A very close second, NRG Esports will look to complete its third time as the No. 1 seed from North America. With the addition of Garrett 'GarrettG' Gordon, the team has 'potential,' but to call it a favorite would be a stretch. The match between G2 and NRG could decide North America's top spot.
3. Genesis
Genesis is hard to dissect. Purely based off of individual skill, it'd rank easily in the Top 3. The potential to tilt looms largely over Genesis though. When it's lost a first game in a three-set series, it's shown signs of struggle. But if Genesis can keep its heads level and keep Trevor 'Insolences' Carmody in his current form, the sky is the limit.
4. Selfless
Whether or not Selfless can finish in the Top 4 relies heavily on how consistent its lineup can be. If it keeps rolling on its current momentum, it'll likely clinch that spot. Selfless has shown its potential peak with a win over Iris, and if that level sticks around, Selfless could even take down G2 or NRG, and perhaps push higher.
5. Take 3
Take 3 had a worrying start to the offseason, locking in its roster at pretty much the last minute. The team looked strong in open qualifiers though; losing 3-2 to Genesis isn't a bad start and a sweep over Heroes of Tomorrow to qualify looks pretty good, all things considered. If Take 3 can improve as it plays together, it might even be able to start taking sets off Genesis.
6. Denial Esports
Denial is a team that we underrated mostly due to lack of results. Losing 3-1 to NRG and beating Spectrum and Eggplant isn't a terrible result in any way, but Denial will look to keep pushing up towards the upper echelons of North American Rocket League.
7. Atelier
Atelier is hard to rank. It has one of the best single players in North America, Isaac 'Turtle' App, but what he has surrounded himself with looks nowhere near the level of Orbit from last season. Losing 3-2 to Radiance is frankly a shocking result for the level Atelier would expect to play at. Bringing it back a bit by taking down Freestylers In Disguise 3-1 is a much more solid record, but we need to see more from Atelier to move them up the rankings.
8. Radiance
It feels wrong to rank Radiance so low, since it completed the biggest comeback in all of RLCS. Taking down both Iris and Atelier to qualify in the winners bracket is one of the biggest upsets in the history of Rocket League. Unfortunately, it seems quite likely that Radiance will be the punching bag of North American League Play.
Europe
1. FlipSid3 Tactics
FlipSid3 Tactics is still the best team in the world. We've said this for eight months but it's really just the truth. Led by Mark 'Markydooda' Exton, FlipSid3 will look to solidify the fact that it's still the top dog in global Rocket League. The only concerns for the team and its dream of a second consecutive title are the surging contenders, Northern Gaming and Team Secrecy.
2. Northern Gaming
Rocket League Championship Series
What do you get when you take the second best team in the world and add the best free agent in the world? A true contender for the top spot. David 'Deevo' Morrow will look to be the edge Northern needs to surpass FlipSid3. While that's a tall order, Northern should feel confident in its ability to become top contenders in Europe, especially under the leadership of Remco 'Remkoe' den Boer.
3. Team Secrecy
Team Secrecy today is the fruition of a lot of hard work. With the addition of Linus 'al0t' Möllergren, the team has hopes of being a contender at the very top of the global stage. Qualifying with a 3-0 over Red Eye, Secrecy might just ride that wave of good form for all it's worth as it heads into League Play.
4. Pocket Aces
Pocket comes in over Mock-it for one reason and one reason alone: the 3-2 defeat it handed Mock-it to qualify for League Play. Pocket and Mock-it are as close as two teams can be and the fact that one of them will most likely not qualify for the Grand Finals feels like a crime. With the core of the Mock-it roster that finished second last season, Pocket coming in fourth is much more of a testament to Europe's strength than its individual weakness.
5. Mock-it Esports
Mock-it qualified for League Play 3-0 over PENTA after a heartbreaking loss to Pocket Aces. If we could put two teams in fourth, we would, but unfortunately, someone has to end up fifth and today that's Mock-it. Similarly to Pocket, Mock-it being fifth speaks truly to how stacked Europe is as a region. If the team were in North America, Mock-it would be surely be contending for the top spot.
6. The Leftovers
The Leftovers qualified for the RLCS League Play with a 3-1 over Leaf Esports. Don't let the scoreline deceive you, the performance put in by Nicolai 'Snaski' Andersen was one of the best individual performances in the history of Rocket League. If Snaski can somehow keep that level up for League Play, two things will happen: One, Snaski will inevitably become the best player in the world. Two, Leftovers will make the Grand Finals. Short of that, a sixth place gatekeeper finish for The Leftovers is the expected result.
Rocket League Championship Series 2020
7. Cow Nose
Cow Nose (formerly Xedec Nation) begins the group rounding out Europe's League Play participants. Beating The Leftovers 3-2 almost edged the sixth spot for Cow Nose and getting 3-0'd by FlipSid3 is nothing look down upon but if you want to be a Top 6 team in RLCS, dropping a game to Copenhagen Flames can't happen. Cow Nose is a solid team but the skill above it is going to be hard to surpass.
Copenhagen Flames/Leaf Esports/Red Eye/PENTA
Due to Zentox being disqualified, a playoff will be held between the four teams listed above to determine the final participant..