Marvel Rivals Yellow Jackets face harsh loss against Winthrop

By Balen Allain

From left to right: team captain Ben “Fysx” Jones, Cooper “Disciple_91” Brackney, Alan “RogueWSargeant” Alexis, Logan “log_hoffman” Hoffman, and Logan “H3RSCH” Herschberger. 

Cedarville’s Marvel Rivals team lost 3-0 Thursday night to Winthrop University’s iron grip. 

“This is the back end, so a lot of these games are gonna be some of the harder games,” said Jared “Sphinx” Toyer, who wasn’t playing this night. 

Winthrop has a lot of good players. In fact, Toyer thinks they’re better than Cedarville’s. 

“They have a lot of strong players, but just because you’re a really good player doesn’t mean that you play well at the time,” Toyer said. “If you’re not playing with your team, you’re playing a solo game, and that’s not a game you can win.”  

The Yellow Jackets have been improving over the season. 

“We had a really nice win last week against Ohio State, which I believe means that we’ve clinched at least playoffs from this bracket,” Logan “log_hoffman” Hoffman said. “Obviously, we’re still going to try our best and win this game.” 

Toyer highlighted their improvement in knowing when to assault the opposing team. 

“It’s making sure you have your whole team there and everyone’s ready to go,” he said. 

On to Dominion, Winthrop held strong against Cedarville and captured the point with an ironclad defense. Cedarville tried to return the favor, and they got quite close, but Winthrop came in and broke their hold for a 1-0 lead. 

“We’re getting slapped,” team captain Ben “Fysx” Jones said. “We need to do more damage. We kind of just played sloppy.” 

After a short break, they hopped into Convoy, Winthrop tasked with defending the payload. Cedarville pushed well, holding them at halfway to the first threshold for a while. Winthrop continued to the 50% mark before Cedarville recaptured. 

In this game of give and take, Winthrop recaptured the Convoy and pushed past the second third. Unfortunately, their iron-clad defense turned to steel, and Winthrop completed the escort. 

Cedarville had to tie to stay afloat, and they mirrored Winthrop’s work, consistently maintaining control past a few hiccups and pushing the payload past the second third. They had to concede the payload for a minute, then retook and progressed to the end. Into overtime, Winthrop pushed forward and kept them from claiming the tie. 

Philip “Lazr boy453” Parker felt they needed to focus on a particular few of Winthrop’s team, and Alan “RogueWSargeant” Alexis agreed. 

“It’s very frustrating going up against Angela,” he said. “As a tank your main job is to stand in front of your team and try to protect them as much as possible.” 

The character Angela is capable of pushing the tanks of the team, who are named such for their role of absorbing the opposing team’s damage. 

“It makes your tank isolated, who doesn’t have enough healing to stay alive, and it also makes your team very weak,” he said. 

Staying near walls and smaller areas of the map would rectify this, as there wouldn’t be anywhere for Winthrop’s Angela to push him. 

Convergence kept Cedarville on their toes. Winthrop gradually gained ground, capturing the first point and escorting the payload to the second. That incremental work earned them all three points, again putting the Yellowjackets in need of a tie. 

Once again, Winthrop held the reins, and they bled Cedarville’s timer, winning Convergence and the night. 

Hoffman thought they could have done everything better. 

“They were better than us by miles, so it’s actually harder for me to tell what their strength was,” he said. 

He complimented their team composition, pointing out that survival was difficult in an echo of Alexis’ comments. After the game ended, the team discussed how their lines were constantly undermined. 

“This is kind of good – it wakes you up,” Hoffman said. 

Cedarville Esports streams on YouTube and Twitch, under the same name. Rocket League typically plays on Tuesdays at 7 p.m.; Smash on Thursday at 7 p.m.; Marvel Rivals on Thursday at 8:30 p.m. Old streams are viewable as VODs. 

Balen Allain is a senior Broadcasting, Digital Media and Journalism major focusing on Audio and Journalism. He enjoys gaming, writing fiction, and making music.