Filipino-dominated Team Secret notched their first victory in the Valorant Champions Tour (VCT) Pacific: Stage 2 after surviving a three-map thriller against Global Esports, 2-1, last July 19, at Sangam Colosseum in Seoul.

After a losing debut against Nongshim Redforce (NS), the new-look Team Secret lineup, including new pickups Nguyễn “n1zzy” Tấn Thành, Sha “ZesBeeW” Mohtar and Kelly “KellyS” Sedillo, bounced back stronger to take a 13-5 win on Bind and secure the deciding map, Lotus, 13-11.

Brheyanne “Wild0reoo” Christ Reyes led the Adobo Gang in the stat sheets with a series Kill-Death-Assist (KDA) of 59/42/18 and an Average Combat Score (ACS) of 253.

For Global Esports, in-game leader (IGL) Savva “Kr1stal” Fedorov led the kill count with 47, while Filipino controller Federico “Papi” Evangelista had a team-high 19 assists.

Both squads hold a 1-1 record in Group Alpha and occupy second to fifth places with Korean squads NS and DRX in a quadruple tie. Gen.G (1-0) currently is on top while defending champions Rex Regum Qeon (0-1) are on the bottom of the group.

Room for improvement

Despite picking up the series, Team Secret head coach Ji “meow” Dong-jun is bent on refining the squad’s strategies. “It’s good to win but we still have a lot of mistakes that we have to fix,” the tactician said during the post-game interview.

One of his concerns was their defensive side in Lotus, where the team saw the eight-round lead they built with a blazing first half fizzled out to just one in the closing moments.

“I think we should have won it a lot faster and it took us very long,” Ji said. “If we [executed] the retake very well, I think we could have won it a lot earlier.”  

He also noted the poor performance in their map pick Corrode, which Global Esports stole with a 13-9 win. “The way that we played today, we just played really bad [in Corrode],” he said, explaining his team’s difficulties in adapting and occupying the middle section of the map which resulted in multiple round losses.

“Other than that, I think we played very well,” Ji said. “We have minor errors we have to fix, but the major parts I think we already know what to do.”

He also commended Mohtar’s performance in Lotus, with the IGL notching a 28/14/11 scoreline using Omen after struggling as Neon in Corrode where he was limited to 12 kills. 

As one of the holdovers from Stage 1, Reyes embraced the newcomers, especially with the energy they give off to lift the team’s spirits during the matches. “I think the addition of the three, they’re really hyped, especially ZesBeeW [Mohtar],” he said.

He cited their new skipper and flex player for stepping up after Jessie Cristy “JessieVash” Cuyco and Jeremy “Jremy” Cabrera were benched during the roster rework. 

“ZesBeeW’s like the clown of the team and Kelly is just Kelly,” Reyes said.

Team Secret had a roaring start on Bind with a triple kill from Thành at the twelfth round securing an 8-4 advantage at halftime, which was immediately followed by a 5-1 run for a 1-0 series lead.

Led by Kr1stal, Global Esports ran over Team Secret’s offense as they created a huge 9-3 gap to open Corrode before shutting down a late rally from the Manila-based squad to extend the series in Lotus. 

The Adobo Gang was unstoppable at the decider. They mounted a strong attacking half with a flawless win in the twelfth round to go up double digits, 10-2.

On the brink of elimination, Global Esports threaded six consecutive rounds to trim the gap, 11-8. But a foiled site execution on Round 20 lifted Team Secret to match point, 12-8, before their opponent took three more rounds to cut the deficit to just one.

In Round 24, Thành dropped Killjoy’s ultimate “Lockdown” to initiate a 3-on-3 retake on A site, where Team Secret emerged victorious as they wiped out the attackers to close out the series.  

Team Secret will square off with DRX on July 27, while Global Esports will seek redemption against Gen.G on July 25.

Still on track

In Group Omega, Patrick “PatMen” Mendoza and Paper Rex (PRX) swept their opening assignments against T1 and Detonation FocusMe (DFM), respectively.

PRX eked out a scary 2-0 win against fellow Masters champions T1 last July 16 after back-to-back overtime in maps Haven (17-15) and Lotus (14-12). Ilya “something” Petrov engineered 52 total kills using Yoru, while Mendoza led the server with 27 assists using Fade.

W Gaming had a convincing victory over DFM last July 19 with twin 13-7 victories on Lotus and Haven, respectively. Khalish “d4v41” Rusyaidee shut down their Japanese opposition using Vyze that merited a 41/21/10 KDA to compliment an ACS of 263.

Paper Rex is currently on top of Group Omega, 2-0, followed by Talon Esports (1-0), T1 (1-1), DFM (1-1), Zeta Division (0-1) and Boom Esports (0-2).

The Masters Toronto titlists will play Boom Esports on July 27.