Round 9 at Heroes Lounge

This weekend marks one week away from the Playoffs of Heroes Lounge Season 2. Last Sunday, the matchmaking was done for the ninth and therefore last round of this season. After today, Heroes Lounge teams have one week time to finish their last games. Some of the left games are interesting match-ups and will determine who of the teams will make it to the Playoffs and who is done for this season.

As we already announced in a separate Blog post, the first eight teams of Division 1, the first five teams of Division 2 and the top three teams of Division 3 will make it to the Playoffs. Keep that in mind when we going to round up the standings and what happened last week.

Division 1

 When we take look at the current standings in Division 1 we can see how the games last week shuffled the teams. At the top we have currently the No Trick Ponies with 9 wins to 0 losses. Heroes Lounge Season 1 winner have managed to take down Blame The Healer last Super Sunday in a 2-1 series.

On Wednesday, the Ponies had a bit trouble with Infinite eSports but managed to get ahead eventually in another 2-1 series. Hence, the No Trick Ponies will go into the Playoffs of Heroes Lounge Season 2 as one of (the?) winner of Division 1. 

The top match last week on Super Sunday was the battle of the giants between FAT #5 and Gorge good Ult. In an impressive series we saw games on the highest skill level of Heroes Lounge. Fights went back and forth, but eventually FAT#5 could manage to secure the victory over the series and the second spot in Division 1.

We have now three teams with 7 wins so far. Currently on rank #3 we have Lord of the Pings who earned their last victory over ESOX Come Un Treno last Thursday. Since Lord of the Pings joined the Heroes Lounge Season 2 competition in Round 3, no team was able to take them down. However, with Gorge good Ult and Natus Dominari on rank #4 and #5, we have two teams who potentially will get ahead of Lord of the Pings in the Division 1 standings. Natus Dominari will go up against Throw The Advantage and they should be the clear favorite to take the win of the series for themselves. Gorge good Ult, however, have to go up against Team TFT which is a quite tough opponent. Team TFT showed a convincing performance over the course of Season 2 and although they are standing right now on the eigth rank of Division 1 - on the last qualification spot for the Playoffs - they need to win that game in order to make it to the Playoffs 100% sure. The moment when a date for this match-up is scheduled, we will be looking forward to that game and to see if and how all these roster changes of Gorge good Ult will affect their performance.

#####Division 2 Looking at the ranking of Division two, there only two teams so far who have played their last rounds games so far which leaves Division 2 Playoff spots still quite open for changes. However, looking at the match-ups of Division 2, there are some strong favorites for the top spots in Division 2 at the end of the ninth round. Throw Inc., Team Solid, and Starboys have all won seven matches and all are going into their last games so heavily favored that we would be surprised if even one of them would not make it into the top three.

For the other two teams in Division 2, things do not look so clear. Despite the fact that iNsiders as well as Don Our Fedoras have already played their last match, both of them have to hope for a - from their perspective - positive outcome of the matches between the other teams in the top 10 of Division 2. Although, iNsiders won their last match, they cannot get a eigth win since a week of inactivity throughout the season. Don Our Fedoras on the other hand fell to the rigging of the matchmaking, faced a complete new team in Heroes Lounge in their last match and lost. Now they stand at 7-2 and have to fear that even after a strong season they won't make it into the Playoffs. The best case for Don Our Fedoras and iNsiders would be if TheMadScientist or CoB PyroTap would lose their remaining matches. Otherwise we would have a tie between four teams for the fifth Playoff spot in Division 2. TheMadScientist won on Thursday against the Abatheurs - a team which was even on the top spot of Division 2 for the first half of the season but then fell in the ranking due to several consecutive losses. Now theMadScientist have to face Calm Senible Gaming in their last game. Calm Senible Gaming is a rather new team as well, thus, any estimates how they are going to perform are not really reliable. CoB PyroTap have two games left. On Monday they are facing the Abatheurs and on Wednesday Nightmare. Although Abatheurs seem to be defeatable, judging from their last performances, Nightmare - former Oviedo Gaming - is a team which is unbeaten in season 2 but lack games due to inactivity or scheduling problems. Anyway, PyroTap have to win both of the games in order to have any chance on the tiebreakers for the Playoff spot and a revenge on Don Our Fedoras and TheMadScientist. #####Division 3 Division 3 was the problem child for many, many rounds and then ... the GREAT RIGGING happened. Remember, two weeks ago we had 7 similar placed teams on the top position of Division 3 and everybody was already planning for Playoffs for Playoffs spots. Then we introduced the map score in the ranking and teams feared that they would lose any chance on a Playoff spot due to leaving one or two maps on the road throughout the course of the first seven rounds of Heroes Lounge Season 2. Things have changed and the matchmaking rigged some beautiful games for us.

Blackhearts Booty were the first team which could qualify for the Playoffs in Division 3 by winning on Thursday against Team Krarsem! 2-0. The Silver Plebs have shown in the last two weeks that they are worth of playing in the Playoffs at the end of the season by taking down the Overextenders and Up In Smoke last Sunday and on Thursday, respectively. Both of their opponents were unbeaten in Season 2 until they met the Silver Plebs. Now, only one Playoff spot is left and the only two teams who are still able to qualify were matched against each other. How are the odds? Really ... serious question! If you know it, tell us. Some claim it is 3%, some claim it is 40%. Isn't their any mathematician among you guys who might help us out? Anyway, Chriand and Stormstout Brewery showed a dominating performance in their Heroes Lounge matches this season so far. Now, they are going up against each other and even if both of them have not lost any match, one of them will not make it to the Playoffs. This Round 9 game is a tiebreaker! So they decided to play this match on Sunday the 19th - the last possible day. ###Playoffs During the last week, a team of many casters, mods, and one Lounge Master have started to clarify details about the Playoffs which will take place in two weeks from now. Special thanks to [Robb](https://twitter.com/RobbParris) at this point!

Later today, you will be able to read about the schedule, the seedings and some rule changes in a seperate announcement post on the website. Until then, you can enjoy these Heroes Lounge matches on Slightly less Super Sunday ... or Small Super Sunday or which ever alliteration you want to use for today: * [Div 1] James Baker™ VS Blame The Healer - 3:00 pm CET * [Div 3] Fast Transition VS MVP B(ronze) - 8:30 pm CET * [Div 2] Team Solid VS Golden Poulay - 9:00 pm CET Bayaz and Tetsu are going to cast the first game on our main [Heroes Lounge Twitch.tv channel](https://twitch.tv/heroes_lounge) and when you are on it make sure to spend some of your revlo points on our Giveaway of a *Funny Bunny Murky* Skin and leave us a Follow. At this point we are not that far away anymore from our 1000 Twitch Followers which we would like to have until the Playoffs of Heroes Lounge Season 2 and which will mark the end of our Giveaway of *1x 20€ battle.net gift card*.

###HGC Open Division Cup 3 on Monday Next Monday, the 13th of February 2017, the third Cup of the Heroes of the Storm Global Championship Open Division will start at 18:00 CET. Heroes Lounge teams will participate again and here is the list of Heroes Lounge teams you should keep an eye on: *mYinsanity (World Rank 115) *Gaming in the Rhythm (World Rank 214) *iNsiders (World Rank 291) *Blame The Healer (unranked)

*We wish all of you good luck with your upcoming matches in Heroes Lounge. If you want to stay up-to-date with all the things happening inside Heroes Lounge, make sure to leave us a follow or subscription at [Twitter](https://twitter.com/hotslounge), [Twitch](https://twitch.tv/heroes_lounge), [Facebook](https://facebook.com/heroeslounge.gg), or [YouTube](https://YouTube.com/c/HeroesLoungegg).*