PACIFIC, Missouri – In a lobby of blue bloods, new bloods, and teams only letting blood, the freshly-picked Pacific Indians A-team landed in the middle of their very first match Thursday, placing 8th out of 17, with the B-team placing 16th.

The match started with many issues, as Pacific was unable to stream the match due to MOSEF’s rules on broadcasting Apex, which state that all matches must be streamed from a player’s point of view. This issue could not be resolved, leaving the excited fans of Pacific to stalk the match’s Overstat page for leaderboard updates.

Game 1

In spite of this, though, the first game began, where seniors Nick “dark_reunion523” Johanning (playing Mirage) and Colton “NotLuckyRNG” Ockleston (Loba), as well as sophomore Caleb “Glitched Da Kitty Cat” Delancey (Lifeline), landed at Launch Site. They would loot up quickly, searching chests around the location before trying to hunt down other teams.

But as it turns out, they’d be the ones hunted, as North County’s A-team would find them, with glorebp27 drawing first blood as he took down Johanning with an SMG. The Raiders would continue their attack, causing Delancey to fall at the hands of Dylan fire34’s SMG. Luckily, Ockleston would escape nearly unscathed.

Meanwhile, Team B, consisting of freshman Kyle LaFrance (Lifeline), junior Jacob Snyder (Pathfinder), and freshman Nasir Oliver (Bangalore), had landed at Echo HD. They looted up, obtained shields, and then used a passive strategy of simply rotating into zone.

This worked until second circle, in which they encountered three different teams, and were quickly executed at the hands of defending state champions De Smet, landing them in 12th place for the first game.

Just northwest of them, however, was the A-team. Colton Ockleston had resurrected his lost teammates in the meantime, and was now in the third ring with 10 other teams.

Unfortunately, he never actually got North County off of his tail.

Delancey and Johanning would once again fall to the marauding griefers of north St. Francois County, as, in parallel to their last encounter, Ockleston would once again escape without sustaining much damage. He would quietly rotate into the ring, trying to survive. Sadly, that would prove to be futile, as he was mauled by a pack of blue-blooded jaguars that look like tigers, being killed in mere seconds by CaptainCSN of fellow Group D competitor Waynesville. They would go on to win the game, and eventually the match. Pacific A placed 8th.

Game 2

We return to Echo HD, as Team B once again drops down in quest of victory. They execute the same strategies as the previous game, until being jumped by, coincidentally, North County B. The Raiders would cut them down like a hot knife through butter, landing them in 16th.

Going back to Launch Site, team A looks a bit different, with Ockleston now playing Newcastle, and Johanning Bloodhound. They loot up, shield up, and then are approached by Hazelwood West. In yet another strange parallel, Dark and the Kitty Cat are slain, leaving Ockleston as the last man standing.

Albeit with a bit less health than the last two times, he escapes with the indirect help of the Spartans, who take down the Wildcats as he escapes from the soul-crushing maw of defeat once again. This would define most of the game, as in search of a Respawn Beacon, he would encounter the Cadets of CBC near Storm Catcher, run away, and then rotate to the top of a mountain northeast of The Pylon.

This is where he revived his teammates, as they came down to the ground and encountered their most hated and least formidable enemies…

The Union Wildcats.

Caleb Delancey, the valiant sophomore, took his Mastiff Shotgun to their heads like a moth to a flame, a flame which would be reduced to embers in mere seconds as he sent Union packing.

Basking in their victory, the Indians had a brief encounter with Hazelwood Central B, before both them and the Hawks had to rotate into the zone. They’d continue rotating and playing defensively, before they encountered, you guessed it, North County A. They fought hard for the bronze crown, but alas, the maw of defeat crushed the three fighters, landing them in fourth place.

Waynesville would also win this game.

Postgame

Pacific A placed 8th overall, with two kills and nine points. Pacific B would narrowly escape last place with one point and no kills, winning the placement tiebreaker over sworn enemies Union B. This was a very positive outcome for the burgeoning program, especially in a match featuring some of the most dominant programs in MOSEF history.

“We started to get kills near the end, but they’ve played for a lot longer than we do,” said Nick Johanning as he reflected over the match.

ARN analyst and reporter Quinn Jones would go on to ask Caleb Delancey about his teardown of Union.

“I didn’t even know they were Union,” he responded. “I just saw and shot.”

Group D (Pacific, Union, North County, Waynesville, Farmington, Fox) goes up against a stacked Group A (Benton, Blue Springs, Blue Springs South, Lee’s Summit North, Van Horn, William Chrisman) next Thursday, in a brawl that will almost certainly come down to who is better between BSS and Waynesville. You can watch that on Pacific’s Twitch channel.

For more stats, as well as the replay, you can visit the match’s page on Overstat. Additionally, ARN will continue providing exclusive coverage of Indians eSports for the rest of the season.