📝 Blowouts and Rebounds: OWCS NA Stage 3, Week 2 Summary

Week 3 in North America marches on as we get one weekend closer to the World Finals in Stockholm. However, this past weekend’s matches went fairly quickly and concluded as most would have expected.

Game of the week: Team Liquid vs Extinction

“All throughout this year, the gap between regions has been getting smaller…Every new LAN is another chance for other regions to punch up.” - Elliot “TR33” Chu.

The headline match for Week 2 took place on Saturday when Team Liquid faced off against Extinction. This match would become a test for Extinction, as although they are a lower-seeded team in this stage, their ambitions are set on playoffs. For Team Liquid, this would be their chance to back up their declaration as the best team in North America.

The match started as expected, with Team Liquid taking Extinction to what Coach Danny "Danny" Mychakov considers their best map: Ilios.

Elliot "TR33" Chu showed a dominant performance on Genji, supporting Boston “Infekted” Fine’s dives on Wrecking Ball. Coraline "Hitori" Engler did try to set up counter dives and prop up Landon "Vision" Monteferrante on a surprise Sombra pick, but the rest of Team Liquid prevented any attempt at a hack-dive combo. They easily took the map without breaking a sweat, only suffering one total elimination across two rounds.

However, when the game shifted over to Extinction’s map pick on Aatlis, momentum began to shift. With Wrecking Ball banned, Hitori was able to bring out her comfort pick of Hazard, which synergised well with Vision’s swap to Reaper and Rene "k1ng" Rangel on Tracer. This pick was easily able to shut down Infekted’s Winston, which forced Team Liquid to rethink their strategy off the scientist and swap to a Hazard of their own. This pressure from Hitori’s Hazard was enough to push this map to a 5-point clash.

Yet even when they didn’t have their dominant Wrecking Ball, the rest of Team Liquid was able to prevent Extinction from taking the map from under their feet. Xavier "zeruhh" Zambrano fought a high-stakes Tracer duel against k1ng and was able to come out on top thanks to help from clutch support plays from Rupal "Rupal" Zaman and Diego "Vega" Moran. While the fight was much closer than expected, Team Liquid was able to take Flashpoint 3-2 and bring themselves up 2-0 in the series.

King’s Row ended up being somewhat competitive despite Wrecking Ball being back in play for Liquid. Extinction was forced to capture Point A in Overtime. Even when the cart did start rolling, Team Liquid was able to shut down any push that either Vision or Hitori attempted, greatly aided by massive damage output from Vega’s Wuyang. As the map flipped for Team Liquid to attack, it was over in the blink of an eye, as Team Liquid easily pushed the payload and won the series 3-0.

This match reinforced the belief held by many North American teams that Team Liquid is currently the strongest team in the region in this meta. However, Extinction was able to expose a potential weakness in Team Liquid’s strategy. When Wrecking Ball was banned, Hitori demonstrated how forcing Infekted off the hero can lead to success, which largely contributed to their pushing Liquid to 5 points on Aatlis.

While this match wasn’t a real test of strength for them, it did show how Infekted’s Wrecking Ball will likely be the sword Team Liquid will use to bring the team to Stockholm.

Player of the week: Benjamin "UltraViolet" David from Geekay Esports

While other players have begun to showcase their strengths on past comfort picks, one player has shown his prowess to grow and expand his hero pool to new heights — UltraViolet.

Benjamin "UltraViolet" David has always been a superstar flex-support player ever since his breakout onto the scene on American Tornado, and that continued as he joined the Overwatch League on the Atlanta Reign and Toronto Defiant. When he first made his journey into OWCS, he was initially overlooked for other potential flex prospects — a decision that only seemed to light a fire in him.

2025 has arguably been the best year of UltraViolet’s career — a claim made even stronger by his emergence as the region’s top Wuyang player.

Whether it’s setting up prime dives for his Wrecking Ball player or dealing the most damage in the lobby thanks to the Triple-Shot from the Falling Rain perk, UltraViolet continues to dominate his way throughout North America and earns himself OWTV’s North American Player of the Week.

Meta read: Zarya vs Dive and Hitscan’s slow creep

The meta in North America saw interesting developments as teams began to find the strongest combinations that work best with their individual skill sets.

Since Ramattra left the meta, dive compositions returned to the forefront of many teams’ styles. This naturally meant most teams with traditional main tank players gravitated towards the Wrecking Ball selection, which had shown great results in Korea and in Week 1 of North America. And Ball has shown himself to be an incredibly effective option, with three of the top four teams using the hamster to help secure an edge against the competition.

However, for teams without strong Wrecking Balls or main tank options, Zarya continues to be a very menacing selection. This selection has worked for teams like Spacestation Gaming, who have used the Russian powerlifter to great success, despite some teams neglecting the hero.

Watch: Interview: baz: "Zarya... a 2 year old could play that character." | DhillDucks

In terms of the DPS selections, Week 1 saw a difference of styles between regions. When the games started in Korea, the Season 18 balance changes had just launched, which prompted many teams to launch their campaigns with a Genji-Tracer duo. That trend also carried over to North America, which teams like Team Liquid utilised to bring them to a 2-0 record to start their season.

For teams that did not have strong Genji players, Reaper slotted in perfectly. This pick also continued into Week 2, with many hoping this pick would help them against Wrecking Ball and Winston compositions.

Teams like Spacestation, Geekay Esports, and NTMR also brought back hitscan options. These teams notably lack a second DPS player who specialises in flex-picks like Genji, while SSG did not use their second flex option. These teams were able to bring in picks like Cassidy and Freja to secure themselves 3-0 sweeps against the competition.

However, it is important to note that while all eight teams did play this weekend, there were no clashes between the top 4 teams. Higher-seeded teams usually try to experiment and practice other strategies against lower-seeded opponents, so it is crucial to take these meta changes with a grain of salt. A patch also dropped on Tuesday, which could shake up the meta.

Week 2 in review: The line is drawn

Geekay Esports 3 - 0 Sakura Esports

Solid play as usual.

Sakura Esports continued into Week 2, facing yet another heavy hitter in the region. Usual bright spots “xomba” and Carson “pdk” Terry failed to have a noticeable impact in a series that required them to be at their best.

Despite being down for much of the match, Sakura was able to expose a potential weakness in Geekay’s tank match-up, as Alexander "Zeb" Shepard was able to use the Junker Queen to help contest the Wrecking Ball. Still, Sakura was more often than not on the back foot, unable to secure much bot progress on Esperança.

For Geekay Esports, this match continues their streak as one of North America’s best. Compared to last week, the team decided to swap Denis "Lethal" Tari off the Reaper and onto his traditional hitscan roles. Lethal continued to experiment with the meta as he rolled out on Sojourn for Map 1, and Freja for Map 2, before pulling a surprising Torbjorn pick on Suravasa.

Although this match went as expected, it does give a surprising look at the plan moving forward for the team. As teams around them continue to settle into the Tracer-Reaper or Tracer-Genji, Geekay Esports has shown the flexibility to trust their hitscan player on his signature roles and bring them ever closer to victory.

Team Z 0 - 3 Spacestation Gaming

“They [Team Liquid] pay someone at Blizzard to hand-craft the single greatest meta in human history for them … Even one round [lost] of [Control], Casores should be worried about his job if that happens.” - Coach Christopher "ChrisTFer" Graham

Team Z is another example of a lower-seeded team going up against a top-seeded one, and the results of the match clearly show this. Despite Devin “peace” Vasquez and Ryan "ryan" Lawless again proving to be more than capable, they were outclassed by their opposition. Concerns remain regarding their execution of Wuyang-based comps, as the team looked hesitant to take the mirror against Joseph "Lep" Cambriani on Spacestation.

Although this team may not be on the same calibre as Spacestation, they made sure to keep the top NA team in check on flashpoint. When SSG tried to make a few joke swaps while being up 2-0 on Aatlis, Team Z capitalised on these picks, forcing Xander "Hawk" Domecq’s back onto Zarya after a one-life misadventure on Winston. Although the team was able to force two more competitive rounds, Spacestation Gaming was able to lock in and prevent the reverse sweep on Flashpoint.

Watch Interview: Peace: "Pray to god we never see Hawk on Winston" | Team Z

Spacestation’s midseason roster changes appear to continue bearing fruit. Hawk and Lep have demonstrated great synergy with Kamden "Sugarfree" Hijada and Christopher "Cjay" Smith, showing excellent coordination between Zarya bubbles, Tracer dives, and Wuyang blasts.

Interestingly, in this match, there was a notable absence of Alejandro "scissors" Léon, despite being a crucial component of Spacestation’s success against Sakura and NTMR in Week 1 in enabling his team to play double-flex DPS compositions.

Sugarfree mentioned on his stream that fans should not expect him to play much for the rest of the season, as he will instead be focusing on his academic career, returning to the emergency sub role that he previously held for SSG since stage one.

However, Kronik was certainly not a hindrance to the team. Notably, he has shown more flexibility on heroes like Symmetra and has brought a hitscan factor back to the region. Although there is some concern for how the double-flex meta may affect them if scissors is unavailable, their play this weekend should prove to be a testament to their alternative solutions.

As long as Hawk doesn’t play Winston…

NTMR 3 - 0 DhillDucks

“We just have a lot to work on … I think we’ve been having good success [in scrims] over the past week. Even though it was DhillDucks, I think we still played well today.” - Michael "RhynO" Willoughby.

An honourable mention for Game of the Week would be this clash between the Ducks and NTMR.

The Ducks continued their journey throughout OWCS, and although the match did not go their way, it was certainly a much closer bout than many would have expected. Jack “Reyzr” Francis and Antony “Karmez” Luna have been playing some of the best Overwatch of their careers thus far, especially for Reyzr, who hasn’t looked this good since his stint on Revival in Contenders 2021. Although NTMR won both the match and Aatlis with a 3-0 scoreline, the DhillDucks pushed NTMR to the limit.

But much like the other lower-seeded teams in the region, the Ducks play at the mercy of their DPS players. This was the first showcase of Collin “Juice” Renna, and he struggled to make the same impact as Reyzr and Karmez. Although there were some signs of life, the Ducks still have a lot more work to do if they want to secure a match victory in OWCS.

NTMR looked to reverse their trajectory and bounce back after a 0-2 start to their stage, and the team did show some improvement. Tank player Michael "RhynO" Willoughby played full-time and had a significant impact on the Wrecking Ball.

Although the team was able to secure a 3-0 victory, it was certainly closer than many would have expected. Alex "seeker" Taylor's attempts at Widowmaker were routinely punished on Ilios. In fact, the 3-0 score on Aatlis is somewhat misleading, given the many missed opportunities by the DhillDucks to close out the map.

While not the most convincing 3-0 given the expected gap between the teams, at the end of the day, a win is a win. It still leaves some questions unanswered about their potential road to Stockholm, but their next real test will come in the form of Geekay in week 3.