BECKLEY, W.Va. -- The WVU Tech Super Smash Ultimate team dropped its week six match to school rival Rio Grande during East Coast Athletic Conference (ECAC) action Monday night in the Golden Bears esports lab.
Golden Bear smashers Frickroll (Trenton Smith, Jr.), Wolfwarrior (Ian Shaffer, Jr.), ScytheC (Clayton Wilson, Jr.) and AvailingStorm (Thomas Vecellio, Jr.) started off seemingly well in the match, but got caught in the weeds as they found themselves dealing with a particularly menacing Piranha Plant player.
In the East Coast Athletic Conference (ECAC), Super Smash Brothers Ultimate is played in a three-man crew battle format, with each team trying to be the first to knock out all the other team's players. Each player in the lineup enters with three stocks, or lives, and competes until they're knocked out, or they knock out all the competition's players. In other words, each team starts a match with 9 stocks and the first to run out loses. The two teams then play a best-of-three game series.
The Golden Bears used their base lineup for game one, sending out Wolfwarrior as Sora to see what the Red Storm would offer. They'd send out the character Piranha Plant, who quickly dispatched Wolfwarrior's three stocks, jumping out to a quick 9-6 lead. Golden Bears captain Frickroll stepped in with Little Mac next, sensing the need to get the Plant out of the way. The two brawled, and Frickroll came out on top, but with just one remaining stock, bringing the score to 6-4. The WVU Tech captain would nearly carry his last stock to the finish, quickly going 3-0 against Rio Grande's #2 player using the character Sora, and taking two more stocks from their #3, a Byleth, before finally losing it and capping a run of eight stocks taken. AvailingStorm stepped in to close as Joker with a 3-1 stock lead and did so, quickly sealing a game one win.
ScytheC led off for WVU Tech in game two as Bowser, and again Rio Grande sent out Piranha Plant. He'd suffer the same fate, with the Plant going 3-0 and again getting the Red Storm out to an early 9-6 lead. The result forced the Golden Bears to send out captain Frickroll with Little Mac again in the #2 spot to blunt the momentum. Another brawl ensued between the two but the result would flip, this time with the Plant getting the best of the Little Mac but losing two, making the score 7-3 in favor of Rio Grande. AvailingStorm would enter in the #3 position for WVU Tech, this time switching to the character Sonic. The strategy paid off and he was able to vanquish Piranha Plant's final stock, finally getting to Rio Grande's #2 player, the Sora. AvailingStorm would win that encounter but at a cost, losing two vital stocks and having to face the Red Storm's #3, the Byleth, down 3-1. He took one of the stocks but the Byleth had too much cushion to work with, outlasting the Golden Bears for a 2-0 win to bring the match back to a 1-1 tie.
The Golden Bears knew going into game three that Rio Grande would almost certainly send out the Piranha Plant to lead off again, and therefore debated briefly about who to send out first to meet them. Confident after game two that AvailingStorm's Sonic could take a stock or two, they opted to send him out first, hoping to get Frickroll into a late-game closing situation rather than an early-match defensive one. But the Plant seemed to only get stronger, again going 3-0 in the opening set and jumping out to a 9-6 stock lead. Frickroll would need to step in yet again in the #2 spot, and both teams' top players had another epic brawl. He'd manage two stocks away from the pesky Plant but fell, bringing up ScytheC with Bowser and daunting 7-3 deficit. Piranha Plant never dropped their final stock, and went wire-to-wire by starting and finishing game three, winning it 7-0 and taking the match 2-1.
The Golden Bears will return after Spring Break to play their final regular season match of the spring semester against Florida Atlantic University.
