BOSTON -- The crowd goes wild as "U-S-A" chants fill the Boch Center's Wang Theatre. We've seen this before in Seattle in front of tens of thousands, but American pride is at an all-time high following one of the biggest wins on Thursday in the past few months from North America's most popular Dota 2 team, Evil Geniuses.
Four months ago, Wings Gaming decimated Evil Geniuses at Seattle's KeyArena during The International 6, a tournament which Evil Geniuses had won just a year prior. But on Wednesday, a rematch between the teams took place in the Round of 16 of The Boston Major, one of two events leading up to the International 7 in 2017. Evil Geniuses, for their part, reversed the roles and smashed the reigning International champions 2-0.
For Evil Geniuses coach Clinton "Fear" Loomis, a retired player who was on the team during their historic International 5 win in 2015, and also a member of the team who lost to Wings in August, the Wings Gaming win on Wednesday was a massive confidence boost.
"It felt really great [to beat Wings]," he says. "[They are] one of the most respected teams, but especially by our guys in particular. We respect them a lot. Being able to overcome them when we're feeling down was probably one of the biggest confidence boosters we could have."
That boost paid dividends on Friday morning as Evil Geniuses beat Virtus.Pro, a team which has won several tournaments prior to the event and was a favorite coming into the Boston Major. Predictably, the crowd roared for their home team, EG. Hundreds of fans then lined up in the two lower levels of the Wang Theatre to meet and greet with Evil Geniuses.
But despite the Virtus.Pro win, Evil Geniuses' side of the bracket will continue to get harder. The team will now face OG, a two-time major winner that defeated Evil Geniuses at The Summit 6 several weeks ago. That match on Saturday will determine which of the two moves onto the grand finals.
"If we do it make it to grand finals, it's going to be quite the journey and we would be very confident because we would've gone through a lot of the tough competition already," Fear says. "That's the most exciting thing for me. The journey to get to the grand finals is very tough for us."
Unlike previous tournaments, however, there is no second chance here in Boston. One series loss and you're out, something new to Dota 2 tournaments, particularly as The International has been praised for its double-elimination bracket.
"I think what we're really looking forward since we won [Wednesday], the format is kind of interesting for us," Fear says. "It's a single-elimination tournament and on top of that, we believe to have the harder side of the bracket. So basically whoever wins their side of the bracket is guaranteed grand finals, [but] I think our side of the bracket, in my opinion, has four of the best or hardest teams that most people thought going into this tournament."
The Boston Major doesn't just mark a stepping stone for Evil Geniuses in bracket strength, but it's the first major tournament the team has competed in since a massive restructuring in September through October. The team not only made two roster changes -- bringing back Artour "Arteezy" Babaev and adding Andreas "Cr1t-" Nielsen -- but also made organizational changes, having former Dota player Peter "ppd" Dager move to a managerial role atop the organization and Fear became coach.
"I think the restructuring [in Evil Geniuses] in particular was just trying something new," Fear says about the changes. "Before, you would just have some captain, older players just kind of leading the younger guys. Instead [now], we're just trying to bring in all the talent and then we have the older players helping from outside instead of inside the game."
Fear says that he believes in their current talent but that success will rely on how the team's two new members, Arteezy and Cr1t-, mesh into the team.
"It's a new way of looking at it and it's something I think has a lot of promise, because in particular [Arteezy] is a great player," he says. "He hasn't had the most success before but I think I can lend him my wisdom and he can play the role I played better than I can. If they can all just get their stuff together and [Cr1t-] needs to be able to pull them together as the captain, because you need to have an in-game captain. If he's able to pull them, which he's doing a really good job, this team should be, on paper, one of the strongest teams in Dota."
While The International 6 marked an end to Fear's 11-year competitive playing career, his role as a coach in the team is still in the process of being figured out. Like many other retired pros, he has moved into the role without any form of coaching experience. As a player, he was often praised as being an encyclopedia of Dota knowledge, but he seems himself differently in the role. He says that he wants to offer his player skills and knowledge of how to be successful, rather than strategic advice.
"Most of the coaching structure right now [in Dota] is players who are current players but failed to get to an event," he says. "There are a lot of smart players in Dota and someone will be in the qualifiers but it's unfortunate when they don't qualify but they still want to be part of the experience. I'm not going to be actively competing in any tournaments from now on, I'm just going to be using my previous experience. It's still fresh in my head now, but going on in the next 2-3 years, if I don't continue playing, how good will I be as a coach still? I'm not sure. I'll still just do it for now and right now, I am enjoying it and we'll see where it goes."