Fusion and Shock dominant in playoff victories, set semifinal date

The Philadelphia Fusion and San Francisco Shock have made their way to the semifinals.

The Fusion looked strong versus Atlanta Reign starting out on Ilios, with Hyeonjun “Pokpo” Park to Gael “Poko” Gouzerch dying twice before the fighting even started. Although Philadelphia seemed in control of many of the fights, Atlanta squeaked its way to a win on the control map 2-1.

Ask any analyst on the desk and they’ll tell you that the best players on each team were Daniel “dafran” Francesca for the Reign and JaeHyok “Carpe” Lee for the Fusion. Dafran was the obvious winner in this matchup.

Poko spent the night eating dafran’s Graviton Surges, but also landing his famous “Poko Bombs” on D.va. The Frenchman lived up to his reputation in the second game, killing two to three enemies with each dropped bomb as Philadelphia evened the score.

In the third map, Philadelphia gave up the point with a lot of time still left in the bank. Things seemed grim for the Fusion, but they attacked even faster and cut through the Reign. The Fusion had more trouble taking points the second time around, but Philadelphia’s Alberto “NeptuNo” González Molinillo snuck onto the finishing point and capped the last tick to win the map.

The Fusion eventually finished 3-1 over the Reign to move on to the semifinals.

Later in the night, the San Francisco Shock and the Toronto Defiant got started on Busan, where the Shock capped both points for an easy first map win.

Map two on King’s Row kept the momentum flowing for the Shock. Not only was their cap on the point quick, their offense ran over the Defiant’s defense. San Francisco’s DongJun “Rascal” Kim denied a huge EMP on Kang-Jae “Envy” Lee with Brigitte’s Sheild Bash. A full hold secured the second consecutive map for San Francisco.

The Defiant finally showed up in the third game and was able to take both points on Horizon Lunar Colony, but the Shock came roaring back and sealed up a 3-0 sweep.

The Philadelphia Fusion will next play the San Francisco Shock in the semifinals to determine who will head on to the finals.