North American Dota 2 powerhouse Team NP defeated Digital Chaos in a close best-of-five series to the right to compete at DOTA Summit 7.
The victory in the North American qualifiers is the first major achievement for Team NP’s new roster, which dropped founding members Theeban “1437” Siva and Avery “SVG” Silverman for European veterans Adrian “FATA-” Trinks and Johan “pieliedie” Åstrom. Though the roster change was criticized by some as a move away from Team NP’s origins as a North American team, most fans believed that the player swap would make the team stronger. For this tournament at least, they were correct.
Team NP began their campaign through the North American qualifiers with a strong, first-place performance in the group stages, where they went 4-1 overall with wins over compLexity Gaming and Midas Club Elite. In the first round of the playoffs, however, Team NP was knocked to the lower bracket by Digital Chaos in a quick 0-2 series.
Facing elimination, Team NP defeated both SG-esports, who have largely failed to translate their unexpectedly high finish at the Kiev Major into continuing results, and Thunderbirds, who have struggled since leaving Digital Chaos in the weeks leading up to Kiev, to earn a rematch against Digital Chaos in the grand finals.
With a trip to DOTA Summit 7 on the line, the evenly-matched teams clashed for nearly four hours in one of the better best-of-five series in recent memory. But, in the end, Team NP came out on top, thanks in part to an excellent performance from offlaner Arif “MSS” Anwar.
Team NP will join the other qualifying teams—Natus Vincere from Europe, Clutch Gamers from Southeast Asia, and CDEC Gaming from China—and invited teams for DOTA Summit 7 the Beyond The Summit house in Los Angeles from June 14 to 18.
