nVs Takes The Lead

by: Team nVs

photos by: Morgan Lane & Liz Whybrew

In May Round 2 of the Super 7s Series kicked off at Action Paintball Games. After coming off a loss from Round 1 we were hungry for a win. Nick Bancroft, my cousin Chris and I drove down early Friday morning. Along the way we picked up fellow team mate John Robba and continued to Action Paintball for our team field walk.

It was a pretty miserable day as it was cold and raining but after meeting up with the team and sorting out our game plan for the weekend it was off to Karl and Gloria's to chill out and have our ritualized team feed.

Saturday rolled around and it was business as usual. Our first game was against our rival Sydney SWAT. From the starting buzzer the game was intense with both teams not holding back. After some great gun fights and hard fought moves the game ended in a draw. We both knew that we would be seeing each other in the finals. As for the rest of Saturday we finished without a loss which put us in the top spot going into Sunday's games. Our form continued on Sunday and we went on to secure the number 1 spot going into the finals.

The Top 4 teams going into the finals were:
nVs, Sydney SWAT, Sydney Explicit and Vicious Circle.
In our prelim match we faced off against Vicious Circle. The game started off great for us as we jumped to an early lead and took the 4-0 win. This sent us into the final.
In the final we faced Sydney SWAT. As expected, both teams were prepared for a tough battle. SWAT had brought over Ryan Moorhead from Houston Heat for this round. The game kicked off and we drew first blood taking the first two points but SWAT, not to be written off, took the third and fourth. The game finished tied at 2-2 so it sent us into overtime. The overtime point kicked off and both teams played it safe and waited for the other team to make a mistake. With time running out we made our move and we were able to get a couple of quick Gs and break the game open and take the win. With this win, we were now tied 1st place in series points heading in to Round 3.

Round 3 was on 22-23 August. Our first game was against Sydney Explicit. Explicit had brought over Marcello Margott from San Diego Dynasty.   This field was a very open layout which made big moves a lot harder as the back players would pick you off when you crossed those gaps. Our game against Explicit was a fast paced game. In the dying seconds of the game, and with the scores locked at 3-3, Explicit got a red flag and that gave us the 4-3 win. We won our next games against Vicious Circle, HK Reapers and Cult but we suffered a loss against Eastside Raw. At the end of Saturday we were sitting in 2nd place. We knew we could do better so Saturday night we had a team meeting on how we could improve our game for Sunday.

Sunday we faced off and secured wins against TPC, Red Raw, and Climax. Our final game of the prelims was against Sydney SWAT. This was a quick and heated match but when the dust settled we had won 4-2. This placed us both on equal points going into the final, but SWAT had better ED points so they finished the prelims in the number 1 spot. SWAT would face Vicious Circle and we would face Explicit in the semis. Our prelim against Explicit was tough. Explicit threw everything at us! They have been pushing really hard to make it into the Grand Final all season. But, we were able to gain the upper hand and take a narrow 3-2 victory to go into the final against SWAT as they had beaten Vicious Circle.

The Final
I don't know why, but for this final it seemed like the crowd was bigger than usual. I don't know if it was because both teams were on equal series points or because whenever we face off against each other it's always an entertaining match. Either way, a large crowd had gathered for this battle.

With the clock clicking down to the start of the match we all knew what needed to be done. The 1st point didn't go as we had planned - we lost a couple of players early and then lost the point. To fight the battle, we knew what to change as well as changing our lineup. We then won the second point to level the score at 1-1. We then swapped ends and the momentum changed with us. We could hear the crowd rallying and cheering and this spurred us on. We took the next 3 points in quick succession to win the match and the event. Winning the event has put us one step closer to winning back to back Championships as we are now 2 points ahead going into Round 4 in November.

Always first and foremost, we would like to thank Gloria for her dedication and support. We also praise thanks to our pit crew. To our sponsors Dye Precision and Paintball Addiction thank you for supplying the best equipment to help us get the job done. Lastly, we also want to thank everyone who supports us as it means a whole lot to and we can’t wait to see you all in November!!