After making a massive comeback at Evo 2019 earlier this month, Leonardo “MKLeo” Lopez showed yet again why he’s the best Super Smash Bros. Ultimate player in the world by coming in first place at Super Smash Con last night.
There were shades of his run at Evo, especially since he had to go through Sota “Zackray” Okada, Gavin “Tweek” Dempsey, and Ezra “Samsora” Morris to complete it.
Starting with Zackray, Leo had to beat one of the youngest players competing in Ultimate in order to guarantee a spot in the winners side of the top eight. The set went the distance and Zackray pulled out a relatively unknown R.O.B to almost steal the series. In an utter display of emotion, the young prodigy jumped from his seat and fell to the floor after losing to Leo in his second-straight tournament.
Samsora was the next player to stand against Leo and this matchup went much differently than their series in the losers bracket at Evo just a week ago.
The Peach main looked like a completely different player during this tournament, pulling off some insane combos that left the crowd speechless. From grabs to perfect turnip tosses, Samsora showed that he was a real threat to Leo’s crown.
Samsora took game one handily, only to drop two in a row to Leo’s Joker due to some incredible Arsene fueled combos. It took a lot of work to get back into the series, but eventually, Samsora beat Leo and moved on to play Tweek.
Now in the losers bracket, Leo had to run another gauntlet featuring three other top 10 players. He took down Nairoby “Nairo” Quezada, third-ranked Tyler “Marss” Martins, and Tweek to get his shot at revenge against Samsora.
Leo entered the grand finals from the losers side again and was getting outplayed by Samsora early. All of the games were close, but Peach’s combos were crazy, especially when it came to grabs and giving chase offstage.
Samsora came so close to ending it all in game four. Up 2-1, he only needed to land one solid hit to finish Leo’s last stock. But two cross-map chase downs and a surprising kill from a normal Joker Side B led to an eventual bracket reset.
And if you’ve seen Leo play when he’s on a roll and has momentum on his side, you could’ve predicted the outcome from there.
Even though Samsora didn’t make it easy, Leo completed a 3-0 sweep in the reset bracket to win his second Major in a row. This almost certainly guarantees that Leo will spend another season sitting atop the Smash Ultimate rankings.
