VALORANT Community clowns NRG for its one-sided loss
After talking a big game in the first weeks of VCT Americas, NRG Esports suffered a beating at the hands of Leviatán in Week 3. The VALORANT community took the opportunity to prune the braggadocios team as a response.
A bad showing
NRG started Stage 1 of VCT Americas in a relatively stable fashion, beating weakened LOUD, who admittedly were dealing with the consequences of their visa issues, which delayed their practice in preparation for the regular season. In week 2, they took care of the second Brazilian squad, beating FURIA in dominant fashion with a map score of 13-2 and 13-8.
In the aftermath of the match, NRG celebrated themselves by uploading the entire 30-minute-long split game to their Speedrunning channel, making light of the quick and one-sided fashion they had taken care of FURIA.
Going into week 3 with an unbeaten record, the Chilean organisation Leviatán was awaiting NRG. On the back of a strong 2-0 showing against Masters Madrid winner Sentinels during which Erick "aspas" Santos put on a show, the South American team came in with momentum.
NRG's own superstar, Max "Demon1" Mazanov took on the challenge of trying to shut down the Brazilian, stating in a broadcast interview: "I’ll take care of him, don’t worry about it."
NRG would go on to lose the match 4-13 and 4-13 on Sunset and Bind respectively, winning even fewer rounds than FURIA had achieved against them. The table was set for some community-wide Schadenfreude.
NRG's comeuppance
Immediately after the conclusion of the match, all memetic dams broke loose as the VALORANT community ignited with glee over NRG's loss. Sentinel’s Jordan "Zellsis" Montemurro posted his co-streaming recording to his own YouTube channel, titling the video "NRG VALORANT Speedrunning Record" after NRG's initial video.
Reddit user u/matheusamr looked at the stats of the match, finding that Demon1 went one for eight in duels against asaps during the match, mocking the idea that the American would be able to shut down Leviathán’s star player.
The match thread took a similar tune and repurposed Jaccob "yay" Whiteaker Tweet from his time on DSG, repurposing it as a statement Demon1 would make. NRG showed themselves to be good sports to the banter, engaging with their own previous jabs in a self-deprecating manner, tweeting, "sometimes you're the speedrunner, sometimes you are the speedrun."
Running the full South American gauntlet, NRG will have a chance to redeem themselves in the upcoming match against Made in Brazil on April 24 at 2am CET / 1am BST.
