Every Korean team in Paris has a case for the title
Korea send more teams to the Midseason Championship than any other region, and three of the four arrive holding a trophy of some kind.
Crazy Raccoon are the reigning champions of the most recent LAN, the Champions Clash. Team Falcons are the defending Midseason Championship winners. ZETA DIVISION are the reigning Korean champions. Only T1 arrive without silverware, and they may be the region's most dangerous unknown.
All four land in Paris with a real claim on the title.
Crazy Raccoon
Crazy Raccoon have found their stride since the start of Stage 1. Chae "HeeSang" Hee-sang and Jeong "STALK3R" Hak-yong have grown into each other, and Kim "vigilante" Joon has cemented himself as the pillar next to Sung "CH0R0NG" Yoo-min game after game.
They took the first LAN of the season, beating Twisted Minds in the Champions Clash final, and carried that form through a flawless Stage 2 Regular Season. Only ZETA DIVISION managed to stop them, doing so in the Grand Final.
CR sit in Group B alongside those same rivals and open against Pacific champions Team Secret. They would be expected to win, but Team Secret are a complete wildcard, and anything goes in a first-to-two format.
ZETA DIVISION
A third-place finish at the Champions Clash stung, and ZETA DIVISION started Stage 2 on the wrong foot with a loss to T1. What looked like the beginning of a downward slide lasted exactly one week. ZETA won out the rest of the regular season without dropping a single map.
The playoffs brought more of the same. They took out T1 and then Crazy Raccoon to finish the stage as Korea's champions.
The team are firing on all cylinders. Shin "Bernar" Se-won now plays full time, and Kim "Proper" Dong-hyun mastered Shion almost immediately. With Kim "Shu" Jin-seo and Park "Viol2t" Min-ki in the backline, no match against ZETA is over until it is over.
ZETA open against fellow Japanese organisation VARREL. The two last met in OWCS Asia Stage 1, where ZETA edged a 3-2 thriller.
T1
T1 are usually considered a step below Korea's other top sides. That reading undersells them. On their better days, they match their peers and hit above them.
They proved it repeatedly this stage, first by beating ZETA DIVISION on the opening weekend, then by sweeping Team Falcons and ZETA in the playoff seeding deciders. The playoff run ultimately ended against ZETA, but between Kim "DONGHAK" Min-sung, Hong "Proud" Suk-jin, and Kim "ZEST" Hyun-woo, this team is capable of anything.
The draw has not been kind. T1 are in Group A and start against Twisted Minds, comfortably the hardest opening assignment of the four.
Team Falcons
Team Falcons are the odd ones out. Without the Title Defender Program, they would not have qualified for the Midseason Championship through the default routes, having lost to RØDE ZANSIDE GAMING in the playoffs.
The individual quality is still there, even if it has not been clicking. Ahead of Stage 2, the team signed young talent An "SP1NT" Woo-jin to add flexibility next to Baek "Checkmate" Seung-hun and Choi "MER1T" Tae-min. Their seeding decider and playoff performances were woeful, but MER1T's finger injury accounts for much of that.
Coach Choi "Junkbuck" Jae-won sounded confident about the team's work heading into Paris in his interview with OWTV, and the Falcons are known to show up when the stakes are highest.
They begin against North America's top seed, the Dallas Fuel.