The New York Excelsior have had some difficulties this season, as every other team has had along with Blizzard themselves; it’s been a red-letter year for Blizzard, to put it mildly.
NYXL, however, were negatively affected by the pandemic in a unique means, as the players were living in New York City; a place not necessarily known for impeccable broadband internet running through the densely-packed residential housing.
This is why NYXL ended up temporarily bowing out of the Overwatch League, as their players simply couldn’t reliably play from their housing during the lockdown.
In a recent stream from Haksal, you could see all other players finally residing in the same housing, and playing in a massive room. The next day, New York Excelsior sent out an email confirming to their fans that everyone is now under one roof, and finally able to practice without outside hassle.
in a strongly worded letter of encouragement and hope, they stated that it’s finally redemption time, and an opportunity to turn this season around; arguably the worst season NYXL has had yet.
Today, they played their first match under the same roof against the Chengdu Hunters and lost a close battle (3-2) as Chengdu managed to reverse-sweep the Excelsior.
The boys gave it their all but could not prevent the Hunters from reversing the series. We'll reflect on the performance and come out swinging next week. #EverUpward #OWL2020 pic.twitter.com/4hiKiTB6d8
— NY Excelsior (@NYExcelsior) July 18, 2020
Still, things are looking up for the team; it’s their first match since they’ve reorganized everyone safely, and they’ve just started a new regimen; more cynical fans of the League could argue that NYXL can only improve from their more recent showings within the League.
Precisely how much they’ll be able to turn around in a season that, much like the rest of the esport world needs to be played entirely online, has yet to be seen. A lack of latency for in-house scrimmages are always nice to have, yet all matches are played with various amounts of ping, depending on who they are ultimately playing and the server location for the match.
Still, the roster has tons of talent; from their IGL Jong-ryeol ‘Saebyeolbe’ Park that is a shining asset everytime he’s in the server and not riding the bench, to new pick-ups such as Haksal; the roster is stacked, NYXL just need to figure out when to play what at this stage.
They still have a shot at the season 3 finals, which promises to be an interesting close to a tumultuous season that Blizzard needed to go off without a hitch as Home Stands were planned to litter the entirety of the season, and globe, before the pandemic.