Saints Smash Bros. Top SUNY Canton In Person

After narrowly losing their in-person exhibition match at home to the SUNY Canton Kangaroos, the Smashing Saints were hungry for a win where it counted. They received that win in stunning fashion last Monday night in an impressive 2-1 finish.

The Saints arrived at SUNY Canton's Esports Arena with jerseys on and controllers in hand poised for the win. Alex "Legmer" Holland showed up to play first for the Saints with Chrom. Legmer singlehandedly took down every stock the Kangaroos had except for one. Duncan "orchard" Stuard easily cleaned up the remaining stock with Ness, and the Saints were looking to take an early win for the night. However, the Kangaroos rallied in game two and substituted the first leg for a Lucina player who gave legmer a little more difficulty. The Saints then sent in Henry "HennyJ" Julca, playing as Ness, but he could only take two stocks total during the set. The match point rested on orchard's shoulders, but three spikes in a row from SUNY Canton's anchor, playing as Yoshi, forced the Saints to go to game three. This time, the Saints led again with legmer who could only take two stocks against Lucina. Orchard then switched from Ness to Duck Hunt and not only defeated Lucina, but the Kangaroos captain, playing as Cloud, as well. Orchard even took one stock from their anchor playing Yoshi again. The match then rested on HennyJ's shoulders. He needed to take two stocks to give the Saints the win, and he found them both after losing only one stock of his own.

Coach Lanza had this to say about the game, "I told my team that if I had to pick just one game I wanted to win all season, it was this one. We may have lost at home during the in-person scrimmage, but we corrected our mistakes from that day and beat them where it mattered on the road. My players gave some of their best performances to date, and now we are just one win away from making the postseason. We have three upcoming chances to find that win, and I know this team has what it takes to do it."

Saints Line Up
Henry "HennyJ" Julca- Ness
Alex "Legmer" Holland- Chrom
Duncan "Orchard" Stuard-Duck Hunt/Ness
 

Saints Rocket League Wins NACE, Loses ECAC

This week was a mixed bag for the Saints Rocket League team. In NACE, they got a 3-1 win against the RIT Tigers, but lost later in the week 1-4 to the Farmingdale Rams.

The top scorer for the NACE match was Eric "Estream" Staropoli who was able to find the goal seven times in his game against the Tigers. Four of his goals came during the first round of the match, two came in the third, and one goal was the game winning shot in fourth round. Even though the Tigers took the Saints to an extra game, it was John "Terx" Glover who put the match away for the Saints scoring two quick goals in what was to be the final game of the match. The win puts the Saints NACE record at 3-1.

In the ECAC match against Farmingdale, it was Tanner "Gubbins" Bessette who ended up finding the goal the most with five goals total over four games. All three players combined put up their highest scores to date across both games. Despite the impressive scores made by all three members of the team, the Farmingdale Rams were able to find the net even more. Even though the Saints were able to take one game from them in the best of seven series, it was not enough. The loss puts the Saints ECAC record at 1-4.

Saints Line Up
Tanner Bessette (Gubbins)
John Glover (Terx)
Eric Staropoli (Estream)
 

League of Legends Falls to UDelaware

The Saints League of Legends team suffered a tough loss at the hands of the University of Delaware Blue Hens this past Friday. They ended the match with a 1-2 loss, bringing their season record to 3-2. This match was the debut game for first year Ryan "Busy" Jordan who filled in the role of support as Saints' starter Riqui Yang was out due to illness.

Despite this game being Busy's first foray into collegiate esports, he helped support the Saints to game one win playing as his main, Pyke. In the first game, at twenty-five minutes in, the Saints had secured the Baron Buff and were looking to siege the Blue Hen's base. However, the Saints were ambushed in the Mid Lane, and they were almost completely aced until Busy came out of nowhere with two Death from Below executions onto the Blue Hen's ADC and Support turning the tide of the fight in the Saints' favor. The Saints then used that momentum to push all the way to the Blue Hens' Nexus to take the first game.

The second game was a bit more difficult for the Saints since the Blue Hens banned their best champion picks and the Saints opted not to ban the Blue Hens Jungler from playing Hecarim. Zijian "Rumania" Zhang played Fiddlesticks for the first time ever having all his other more well practiced champions banned. Hecarim was able to run roughshod over the entirety of the Saint's line up scoring kill after unanswered kill. The Saints could not find a way to rally around an objective and ended up defeated.

In game three, the Saints banned Hecarim and the Blue Hens allowed Rumania to use his main jungle champion, Rek'Sai. The Saints took an early lead with Rumania getting quick assassination kills in the Bot Lane and finding objectives early. However, as the game progressed past the twenty-minute mark, momentum began to slow down for the Saints. The team became indecisive on whether to find a fight, farm, or take down Baron Nashor. The Blue Hens then caught out the Saints split off between things and then immediately took down Baron Nashor themselves. They used the Baron Buff to push into the Saints' base and win the match.

Saints Line Up
Jasper Gukeisen/Summer (Ornn/Maokai/Malphite)
Zijian Zheng/Rumania (Viego/Fiddlesticks/Rek'Sai)
Minh Nguyen/elew (Sylas/Zed/Vex)
Yixiao Xie/CDC Gangster (Twitch/Kai'sa/Twitch)
Ryan Jordan/Busy (Pyke/Pyke/Swain)