SMITE World Championship Day Two .

As the competition in the 2015 SMITE World Championship trudges onward, the champion prizes and competition continue to skyrocket. The prize pool has climaxed at over $2.6 million (the third largest award in eSports history), and first place will receive over $1.3 million. Everyone here in Atlanta–from the players to the coaches to the fans and commentators–is ecstatic. In case you missed it, here is a look at how Day One went. The Cobb Energy Center is, for lack of a better word, electric.

All the players want the money; all want the glory. But only one team will be crowned the 2015 SMITE World Champion. We Love Bacon, OMG, SK Gaming, and Cog Red fell this afternoon; two teams remain. When the dust settles tomorrow evening, either Cog Prime or Titan will stand atop the main stage holding the SMITE World Championship trophy.  And if today’s matches are any indication of the events to come, the final round will be the most intense pairing yet.

For those of you that do not yet follow our live feed on Twitter (@MMOGames), here is a summary of today’s quarterfinals and semifinals.

Quarterfinal 1: Titan versus We Love Bacon

 

Titan swept the first best of three series 2-0.

Although We Love Bacon made good use of the jungle in the early and mid phases of the game, Titan swept the late phase, killing 60% of the available Gold Furies and sweeping all spawns of the Fire Giant. Repikas played an incredible game with Thor, with a final KDA of 5/4/13. In the late game, he seemed to be everywhere at once. Ataraxia played well, too. His early aggressive push with Apollo in the left lane denied qe3q almost two levels of farm experience. Without that early push, Titan might not have stood a chance in the late game.The final time was 27:57; the final score was 25-16, Titan.

qe3q did not play his best game today.

The second game was a much more dominant performance from Titan. Suzuki and qe3q’s selections of Odin and Zeus spelled We Love Bacon’s downfall. They were both completely shut out from the very beginning. Suzuki died five times; qe3q died six times. Titan on the other hand, thrived in their picks. Repikas once again carried the team. Since no one banned it, he picked up Ao Kuang and rained havock in We Love Bacon’s jungle.

Titan dominated the map in the second match, eliminating all the Furies and Fire Giants. Titan won the match in 22:34. The final score was 28-4.

Quarterfinal 2: Cog Red versus OMG

Quarterfinal two was a bloodbath. Cog Red defeated OMG 2-0 with little contest.

DaGarz’ Thor was the deciding factor in their match with OMG.

The story of this match: Thor. DaGarz played extremely well. He picked Thor twice and utterly dominated with him both times. In the first game, he scored ten kills and thirteen assists. In the second game, he scored sixteen kills and twelve assists. OMG had no answer for him. TheBoosh and Snoopy also played very well, especially during the early laning phases. TheBoosh held a KDA of 5/1/11 in the first match and a KDA of 9/2/14 in the second match. Snoopy ranked in at 6/1/9 in the first match and 5/3/10 in the second match. In short, Cog Red outplayed OMG in almost every position and every phase.

And Cog Red controlled the map. They conquered 71% and 70% of the map in the first and second rounds, respectively. They secured all the gold boosts and Fire Giant buffs, and they maintained a heavy presence at the mid and back camps. In short, OMG was completely outmatched in every area.

But this isn’t necessarily a loss for OMG. They are an incredibly young team, considering the age of the Chinese servers. In a year, Chinese teams will be much more familiar with the SMITE champion pool and meta. For OMG, a team that was forced to play with an incomplete roster, advancing to the quarterfinals was a victory.  Analysts across the board agree that OMG and the other Chinese teams will be reckoning forces next season.

Semifinal 1: SK Gaming versus Titan

In a shocking best-of-three series, Titan not only upset SK Gaming (the second-seeded team)–they swept them 2-0.

Kanyelife, for two hours, was more popular on Google search analytics than Kanye West himself. And he was, without a doubt, the most valuable player of Titan’s roster in the semifinals. He played Ymir in both matches, scoring 2/5/19 in the first match and 1/5/16 in the second match. His wall placement was, without a doubt, the deciding factor in both games. He wrecked Badgah in the first game, and ruined Realzx in the second. He was an unstoppable force.

Kanyelife’s Ymir was falwless.

Titan struggled for a moment at the end of the first game. Ataraxia pushed the left Phoenix twice; he died unopposed on his first push.   He compensated for his death, though, by ganking Realzx as he fled into base. In all, it took almost seven minutes to finish the Phoenixes and kill the Titan. The final score of the first match was  27-15, Titan. The final time was 40:09.

The second game was much easier for Titan. They pushed lanes, controlled the jungle, and toppled towers. They killed every Gold Fury and Fire Giant and defeated the Titan at 29:59. The final score was 22-9.

Semifinal 2: Cog Prime versus Cog Red

The match up between Cog Prime and Cog Red was the closest match up of the entire tournament. It was the only match decided in three games. Unfortunately, Cog Red ran out of steam in the third game, and Cog Prime won the match 3-2.

The first match was even for more than twenty-five minutes. No one gained a clear, decisive lead until well into the late phase. Divios played well for Cog Red, and BaRRaCCuDDa left the biggest impact for Cog Prime. In the end, though, Cog Red managed to sneak away with the win.

MLCSt3alth was the deciding factor in games two and three against Cog Red.

The second match was, arguably, closer than the second. MLCSt3alth made much more of an impact with Nox, scoring thirteen kills and ten assists. Cog Prime faltered in the early stages of the late game, and Red, in an incredible push, was able to topple most of Prime’s remaining towers and Phoenixes. Prime rallied, though. They responded by killing the fire giant, toppling Red’s final mid tower, killing the Phoenixes, and defeating the Titan. Prime won the match in 40:42 with a final score of 34-21.

In the third match, Red defeated themselves. After game two, they appeared to lose all momentum. Prime swept the game in 27:14, the quickest time in the semifinals. The final score was 25-7.

Conclusion

The two remaining professional SMITE teams, Cog Prime and Titan, will face off tomorrow at 2:30PM EST. Both teams have been extremely dominant in the tournament so far. Cog Prime, the statistical favorite, has not yet lost a match up. Titan fell victim to Cog Prime in Round Three of the Placement Stage Friday. That said, this Titan team is a vastly different team from the one that played Prime yesterday. They have gained a lot of momentum; they are the crowd favorite, and they perform extremely well under pressure. They will be hard to stop.