Team Modern Super League 2 continues next Tuesday at 9 PM Eastern (GMT -4) on twitch.tv/magic.
Last night, Pameplmousse defeated Mage Market 4-3 in Week 5 of Team Super Modern League 2. After a clean sweep in their last appearance, Pampelmousse had to battle through a full seven matches, including winning back to back do-or-die matches, to come back from a 3-2 hole and win the week.
Mage Market’s decision to not bring a Hogaak deck didn’t seem to pay off as Pamplemousse was able to win both the matches in which their own Hogaak deck appeared. In fact, Reid Duke piloted the Hogaak deck during both of its wins on the way to an impressive three individual wins on the night.
This loss drops Mage Market 1-1, which means that they’ll have to compete in and win a third week in order to advance to the Top 4. Pamplemousse, on the other hand, was able to lock up their spot in the Top 4 with the win.
The Results
Round 1: Reid Duke (Humans) defeats Michael Bonde (Urza Thopter Sword) 2-1
Round 2: Gabriel Nassif (Azorius Control) loses to Andreas Peterson (Boros Burn) 1-2
Round 3: Logan Nettles (Golgari Midrange) loses to Thomas Enevoldsen (Esper Death’s Shadow) 1-2
Round 4: Reid Duke (Hogaak) defeats Andreas Peterson (Mono Red Phoenix) 2-1
Round 5: Logan Nettles (Boros Burn) loses to Michael Bonde (Mardu Pyromancer) 0-2
Round 6: Gabriel Nassif (Azorius Control) defeats Thomas Enevoldsen (Esper Death’s Shadow) 2-0
Round 7: Reid Duke (Hogaak) defeats Michael Bonde (Urza Thopter Sword) 2-0
Game of the Week
(Skip to 38:10 the the embed does not do so for you.)
This week we will take a deeper look at Duke (Humans) vs Bonde (Urza Thopter Sword) in Game 3 of Match 1.
To start off the game, Duke mulliganed down to six cards and kept a slower, more disruptive hand with one land, two Aether Vial, one Gaddock Teeg, one Thalia’s Lieutenant, and one Kitesail Freebooter. Bonde kept his seven and had a lot of key cards in his opener like Ensnaring Bridge, Dead of Winter and Sai, Master Thopterist.
For the first few turns, both players took turns setting up their boards with Vials and an artifacts. On Turn 3, Duke activated his Vial on two and put in the Kitesail Freebooter during Bonde’s drawstep, where he saw a multitude of must-answer cards. Instead of taking one of the combo pieces, Duke ended up taking Dead of Winter, which he decided would do more damage in the long run.
The following turns showed how powerful Aether Vial is when it comes to the Humans deck. Duke was able to play six mana-worth of creatures off of the two Vials to generate a clock and tempo by bouncing Bonde’s Sai.
On Turn 5, Duke was able to set up a big attack stranding, two Sai, Master Thopterist and a seven-drop in Bonde’s hand to get through the Ensnaring Bridge that was on board, dropping Bonde to eight life. On the following turn, Bonde used Sai’s draw ability and ended up drawing a Lightning Bolt, which is normally a good draw, but Duke’s Thalia, Guardian of Thraben made it uncastable. With that, Duke took the match and started off Team Pamplemousse with a win.