For Beasley Esports and one lucky team of Rocket League players, The Search For The Next Rocket League Team presented by Nerd Focus continues! The first weekend of qualifying matches has concluded with eight teams earning their way to the final event on August 21st and 22nd.
16 teams showed up to battle it out for a spot in the finals event and for the chance to become the next Rocket League team in the Rocket League Championship Series. Of the 16 teams, half of them would get a chance to further chase their dreams.
Michael White, Operations Director for Beasley Esports and General Manager for the upcoming team said, "This past weekend we saw hopeful Rocket League teams give it their all for their chance to qualify for the final event in hopes of becoming the next professional Rocket League team competing under the Beasley Esports umbrella. With some high octane level matches being featured on broadcast, I can only imagine the amount of competition that we will see with our final Qualifier on August 7th and 8th. Be sure to register your team to compete before the August 6th deadline! Reminder, The prize is that our winning team will be paid up to $15k per month for the 2021-2022 RLCS season!."
Team .EXE took the first winners' spot of the qualifiers against Up Down Left Right, sending them to the losers bracket in a 4-0 series. Despite the full sweep, Up Down Left Right did hold their own against Team .EXE and lost each round by only a single goal. Team Dream against Team Synn wasn’t able to completely unfold as it should have, with Team Dream in the win it was likely they’d have emerged victorious regardless, but due to an unforeseen circumstance halfway through the match, Team Synn had to withdraw and Dream made it into the winners' bracket.
Jolly Rogers versus US Army Esports was the standout match of the day, taking the series all the way to a game. Jolly Rogers took early command of the series with around one and two wins by two goals, US Army Esports were able to rally back around and pull off a round 3 win. With US Army Esports trying to keep up, they weren’t able to hold back Jolly Rogers. A 4th round went into overtime at 4-4 with Jolly Rogers taking the win and after 5 minutes in round 5, Jolly Rogers secured the match. Jolly Rogers joined Team .EXE, Dream, and Team Bored in the winners' bracket.
The Losers bracket fights just as hard to keep from being sent home and the pressure was on for Team Bepis after having just beaten Intelligent Monkeys 4 to 2. Their next opponents were Up Down Left Right and it was one of the fiercest matches in the qualifiers. The first round between the two teams went into overtime with Up Down Left Right taking the first win. Bepis shot back across the bow with a 4 to 1 round 2 tying up the series, but it wasn’t going to be that easy to turn around the game. The match went the full distance to a game 7 before Bepis was finally able to come out on top, earning their spot in the finals in the losers bracket.
<em>Final results for the first round of qualifiers for The Search for the Next Rocket League Team.</em>
Despite their strong performance against Jolly Rogers, US Army Esports wasn’t destined to make it out of the qualifiers. In their match against Catch-22, they took an early lead but ultimately fell short as US Army Esports was sent home after a 4 to 2 game.
Teams Isolated and Lights Out were also able to advance through the losers bracket and into the August 21st and 2nd finals. The 2nd round of qualifier matches will take place on August 7th and 8th and it’s not too late to register for your chance to be among the finalists.
Congratulations to the 8 finals from the first round of qualifiers: Team EXE, Bored, Dream, Jolly Rogers Esports, Catch-22, Lights Out!, Isolated, and Bepis. They’ll comprise half of the final 16 for the final event.
