Welcome! My name is Matthew “MattDotZeb” Zaborowski. You may know me as a tournament organizer (TO), a streamer, a commentator, or as a competitor. My most recent endeavor has been the most challenging out of anything I have done with nearly a decade spent in our community: The Melee Games. It has taken a demanding role in my life, and for good cause! Allow me to introduce you to this project through the DotBlog. I will be utilizing this blog weekly, every Wednesday at 12pm EST, to provide you updates pertaining to The Melee Games.

This week I recap the past weekend’s matches, have a preview for this coming weekend, and at the end there’s a special announcement!

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4 School Showdown

First, as you may or may not know, The Melee Games runs crew battles to advance bracket matches. I’m assuming that most readers already know what a crew battle is, but if you don’t, click here! I’ll wait for you to read up and return.

This past weekend saw more than an intense Apex World Circuit event with Do You Fox Wit It?. The Melee Games had three crew battles take place at the University of Pennsylvania, streaming and recording was performed by PGHNEOHsmash (twitch, youtube). The New Jersey Finals (Rutgers vs the New Jersey Institute of Technology [NJIT]) and the Pennsylvania Finals (the University of Pittsburgh vs the University of Pennsylvania) took place. Afterward, the winner of each match fought to determine who would advance to Tri-State Grand Finals.

Rutgers and NJIT faced off in a 5 vs 5 crew battle that turned out to be solidly in Rutger’s favor. A strong opening from Rutger’s Tec9 over NJIT’s DarkSim saw NJIT’s Captain coming in early. FryCook wobbled his way through Tec9 and evened up the crew battle, but lost in a grueling match against Theftz’s Samus on Dreamland. Rutgers would not lose the lead again thanks to the performance of Takoyaki and Swedish Delight. The anchor (the last player for a team) for NJIT and widely considered the best Mr. Game and Watch player in the world, Qerb, was unable to bring out the 5th player from Rutgers and lost convincingly to Swedish Delight’s Sheik.

On the Pennsylvania side, Pitt vs Penn went down as a 5 vs 5 crew battle as well. H Masta J (Pitt) started things off strong, defeating Tongs (Penn) with his Fox vs Falco on Battlefield. RKim came in next for Penn and turned things around solidly, but hadn’t quite evened things out by the time Kofi’s Yoshi ended his run. Strong performances from Vincessantly and Nicholas1024 put Penn in the lead over Pitt, but the mean green killin’ machine that is Abate held it down for Pitt to win with 2 stocks remaining.

In the Semi-Finals of the Tri-State Bracket, Rutgers vs Pitt takes place with another 5 vs 5 crew battle. H Masta J once again opened for Pitt, but was unable to repeat his performance from the prior crew battle. Overflow proved to be too much and solidly 2 stocked him. The following matches put things heavily in Rutger’s favor, with Internet Explorer and Takoyaki cutting through Pitt. Abate, anchor once more, came out swinging and executed Takoyaki’s final stock. DJ Si-Guy (-3), aka Dudeacockus, tried his best with Captain Falcon but came up short by taking only one stock. Swedish Delight (-1) seemed to have no trouble at all closing things out for Rutgers and advanced his team to Grand Finals with a 3-stock victory over Pitt.

4I5B2969Rutgers showed up swagged out in their new team shirts!

Rutgers vs the winner of Cornell and Columbia will be coming up in the next few weeks. The two New York schools will face off at Nebulous on Saturday, November 29th. Tune into the match at www.twitch.tv/FreeSaltines.

Woah, that’s crazy! What’s next?

Let’s turn the page to New England for a moment. In a very exciting repeat of the Grand Finals from the spring, UMass Boston and MIT have once again met up to fight for the title of the best smash school in New England.

The size of the final crew battle is undetermined, but what is certain is that you can watch it live this weekend! Boston’s Apex World Circuit Event, the Boston University Smash Tournament (BUST), is taking place on Saturday, November 22nd and will be live on www.twitch.tv/TheMeleeGames.

Both of these universities have tremendous talent. Here’s a small sample of notable players from each team.

MIT:

XPilot. This is XPilot’s second time participating in The Melee Games, and his first time as Captain for MIT. His ability to strategize and his team’s overall skill level has led MIT convincingly through each of their opponents. His local performance has been improving consistently throughout the past year, as of late he’s received three top8 placings in a string of tournaments this past month. He has recently taken two sets off of Dudutsai, arguably New England’s best Jigglypuff main. Currently, XPilot is ranked as #23 on New England’s GarPR.

Rime. This is also Rime’s second time participating in The Melee Games. This Peach on the rise has consistently performed well in tournaments and crew battles alike. He has also demonstrated an ability to quickly adapt and make mid-game adjustments. He is considered one of the top Peach mains in the Boston area, having taken games off of fellow Peaches: Yat, Mr. Tuesday, and Weapon X. Rime is ranked #25 on New England’s GarPR.

UMass Boston:

Crow & Kaiju. These two players deserve a mention together. Both have participated in the spring and fall TMG seasons, with Crow taking up the helm as UMB’s Captain this fall. These two have quickly risen to prominence as a strong team pairing in New England. They go by the team name Mid Tier Heroes, which reflects each player’s character choice. Crow is a Ganondorf main, and Kaiju is a Luigi main. Most recently, they got 2nd place at Mass Madness 14a, beating SOLAR + th0rn, Dudutsai + Swiftbass, and nearly reset the bracket vs Mafia + Slox in Grand Finals. They have both consistently held down crew battles and are often responsible for taking the most stocks for their team. Oh, and they’re twins.

Klaps. UMB’s rising star, Klaps is ranked 4th on the school’s PR and #17 on New England’s GarPR. He has shown devotion to his Captain Falcon and, despite this being his first TMG (and college) semester, he has taken at least five stocks in each crew battle that he’s been in. He’s taken sets off of multiple strong players from other schools, including Squible, BatSox, and Blahyay. Additionally, he has even taken a set from Mafia and me in different tournaments. Definitely look out for Klaps as he continues to work his way up the ranks.

The Announcement

tmg posterImage created by Kevin “Known Scrub” Altschuler of Northeastern University. Feel free to view his portfolio.

I’m very pleased to inform you all that The Melee Games is officially crossing the nation and landing in California. With the assistance of Victor “V$” Bhattacharyya, Luis “Luis” Martinez-Li, and Ashkon “NorCal Buster” Honardoost, we will be running a NorCal and SoCal bracket that will start in February. Some schools have already been contacted, and we already anticipate over 20 schools participating. More are welcome, of course. Click the image to sign up! To clarify, a school is only qualified to participate when 5 or more players have filled out the sign up form, so make sure to sign up and help your school qualify.

The specifics of TMG: California have not been released yet. You can likely expect that information within the next few weeks. Please feel free to check out www.tinyurl.com/TMG2nd to read the information we put out to the Northeast in September, as we expect Cali to be run in a similar fashion.

Check out the DotBlog every Wednesday at 12pm EST right here on MeleeItOnMe. If you have any suggestions, criticism, or ideas for the blog please feel free to contact me @DotZeb or at www.facebook.com/MattDotZeb

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Thanks to Lauren “Ten” Casapao and Anna “HouseWife” Zotta for their help in editing this entry.