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6 Biggest Moments of the RLCS World Championship
Season four's finals delivered huge plays and storylines before crowning Rocket League's new champion.
Another season is in the books as the Rocket League Championship Series held its World Championship over the weekend outside Washington, DC Gale Force Esports, the European squad that formed over the summer and mostly dominated in the months since, ultimately prevailed with a clean run through the winners' bracket and a sweep in the grand finals.
The final series might have been quick and efficient, but the three-day event didn't lack excitement. Along the way, we saw one big upset, plenty of exciting matches, and loads of amazing shots and plays from the world's best Rocket League pros. We have plenty more coverage planned in the coming days, but to start, here's a look at six of the top moments and storylines from the weekend.
6. Cloud9's impenetrable defense
Cloud9's Mariano "SquishyMuffinz" Arruda is known as an offensive threat, but as this clip shows, he can work his mechanical magic anywhere on the pitch. With Method pushing hard, Squishy zips in for a close save, flips backwards to immediately block the rebound shot, and then he and Jesus "Gimmick" Parra manage to deflect a third shot attempt … and then Kyle "Torment" Storer prevents yet another score. Goals get most of the attention in Rocket League, but tight defensive play is critical too, and Cloud9 showed it on the game's largest stage.
5. G2 on the rise
Less a moment than a story across the weekend, the oft-inconsistent G2 Esports put up a strong World Championship showing, taking down Chiefs Esports Club, Mock-It Esports, and Paris Saint-Germain en route to a fourth place finish. It was captain Cameron "Kronovi" Bills' long-awaited return to LAN after his season one win, and as he told us before the event, he's taken more of a support role to teammates Jacob "JKnaps" Knapman and Dillon "Rizzo" Rizzo. But as this buzzer-beating clip shows, he could certainly finish the job in key moments, too.
4. Chiefs knock out NRG
NRG are the longest-standing North American team in the RLCS, they're three-time regional champions, and the entire roster has been to the RLCS finals all four years. And the Chiefs? Well, they're the former Alpha Sydney squad that most people don't follow closely — because they're from Oceania. But they showed their prowess and serious season-over-season improvement by upsetting NRG in a rousing five-game series, and also pressured G2 and Cloud9 along the way. This was the best of the Chiefs' goals in the series: a beautiful back-and-forth play that leaves NRG helpless.
3. Gale Force and Method go the distance
The winners final proved why Gale Force Esports and Method were the two best teams in the tournament, as they went deep with a wild game six overtime that lasted more than six minutes. It was an exhausting game overall, and one that Method ultimately toughed out, thanks to a sharp midfield passing play between captain Linus "Al0t" Möllergren and Joonas "Mognus" Salo. Method would then lose this thrilling series in the next game, but they battled their way back into the grand finals.
2. Squishy's insane goal
We didn't clip this goal, but "Squishy with the goal of the tournament" is a dead-on title, and the crowd at the MGM National Harbor went nuts. We've seen this kind of ceiling reset shot from SquishyMuffinz before, but it's still magical every time. He pops the ball up, drives from the wall up to the ceiling, drops alongside the ball while repositioning himself, and then throws in a late flip at the last second to send the ball over the defender. It's ridiculous. This Lower Finals shot helped keep Cloud9 in the game, but they'd ultimately fall to Method.
1. Gale Force wins it in overtime
To be honest, the grand finals felt a bit anticlimactic following the two series before it. We had already seen Gale Force scrap it out against Method in a full seven-game series, and then Method clawed back into the grand finals by taking out Cloud9 in six games. Gale Force ultimately took this win in a sweep, but at least we got a thrilling finale with more than six minutes of overtime before Alexandre "Kaydop" Courant's clinching goal dropped in from the right. After months of precision play, Gale Force are the new RLCS champions.
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