ATXVI: Third Weekend

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In last years Alliance Tournament we won 3 matches straight, including victories against Slyce, Hard Knocks Citizens, and We Form Volta before losing to Lazerhawks and Brave on the Saturday and Sunday of the third weekend. In order to make it to Sunday this year we have to win three matches on Saturday alone. Our first match is going to be against TEST. Then the winner of the Lazerhawks/Templis match, and then the loser of the Vydra/Samurai match. Yikes.

Not an easy road by any stretch. But nothing about the AT is supposed to be easy. And the further you manage to make it, the harder the road becomes. That is the entire point. But so far every team we've faced is still in the Tournament, which is a pretty amazing stat when you think about it.

We could technically end up playing CAStabouts again. But first of all we have to manage to win three matches in a single day. Something we've never had to face before. So this is all brand new territory for us. The Pick Em site has us as 80%-20% dogs in the match against TEST, which is awesome. I honestly prefer being the underdog.

I'm not going to pick matches in the losers bracket, but here are my thoughts on the four winners bracket matches on Saturday:

Vydra Vs Samurai
I'm rooting for Samurai in this one, but I think Vydra is the team to beat this year. Vydra will probably win and we'll have to face Samurai in the losers bracket. Because I am an optimistic type person.

 NCdot Vs Skill Urself
or, The Battle of the Former ABA Pilots, as we call it in Discord chat. I don't want either of them in the losers bracket, but I have to give our practice partners the edge here - I think NCdot has the edge to win. But I wouldn't be surprised by either result to be fair.

 Hydra Vs Tuskers
Neither team has really been tested so far this year so it is hard to measure without basing it on past year's experience. Which really has nothing at all to do with anything. Again, can we just keep them both out of the losers bracket? As a former Tusker myself, I'm going to root for them.

Bright Side Vs CAStabouts
I think this is where CAS's luck runs dry and I think Bright Side has this one. This has the potential to be either the worst match or best match among the four. But I think BS wins it.

Can we win three matches in a row? I have no idea. What I do know is that we are going to try like Hell and hope that Bob is on our side and the ammo falls in our favor in each match. After that, it all just comes down to the fight. We know how to fight.

The rest we leave in the hands of destiny.