It's been a great tournament thus far and with the R16 in the books I can quickly reflect on how predictions went and look forward to the R8. My predictions stand at 7-1, while Aligulac and TL were 6-2. No one predicted ForGG falling out (losing to both GunGFuBanDa and Bunny and looking unimpressive), but otherwise things were largely as expected (Aligulac erroneously took iaguz over TLO while TL had FireCake instead of MarineLorD). The most exciting matches were StarDust vs Jaedong and both series of FireCake vs MarineLorD. I hadn't realised there was a draw for the R8, so my subsequent predictions make no sense. Here are the matchups:
StarDust vs Bunny - interestingly, the Dane is favoured (65%), with a winning record against the Korean who notably struggled against Terrans to qualify for WCS; I think this is more dicey than the recent match history or odds would make it, but I'll take the Terran
Lilbow vs MarineLorD - the Protoss is slightly favoured (53%) and has been very good in the match-up of late (uThermal seems to be his kryptonite); on the flip side the Terran is also excellent in TvP, but the one player he loses too is Lilbow (3 of the last 4 series), so I'll take the odds here
Hydra vs Jaedong - what an epic match this is and as confident as the ROOT player was yesterday I can't think he's happy to get the Tyrant this early; Aligulac gives Hydra the slightest of edges (50%) and he holds a winning record against the Dong (6-4, including two series wins recently); neither player is particularly remarkable against other Korean Zergs, but I think the recent history gives weight to the odds so I'll stick with ROOT
Polt vs TLO - a re-match from the R32 where the German pulled off the upset; Aligulac still has the Korean as an overwhelming favourite (80%) and I can't see TLO's fast muta-style alone getting him through this series; the only reason to doubt Captain America is his recent loss to the German, but I don't see that being repeated here
Aligulac and I see things the same way and if we're correct this would be the R4:
Bunny vs Lilbow - the Dane is slightly favoured (52%), despite a losing record against the Frenchman (7-11, including losing back-to-back BO3's less than two weeks ago to him); if this were a few months ago I'd stick with the Terran (when he was virtually unbeatable in TvP), but I like the "upset" here
Hydra vs Polt - a match I predicted in my previous post and I'll echo here: despite the ROOT player's incredible failure in the season one final, he's still favoured here (68%); Captain America's record against Korean Zergs is not great, but Hydra has been slightly less dominant in the match-up of late--still, all the peripherals support him winning, so I'll stick with him.
Aligulac has Bunny and Hydra moving forward, while I have the ROOT player and Lilbow. The finals:
Hydra vs Lilbow - oddly enough the Korean is only slightly favoured (51%), and the French player is literally the only foreign Protoss to ever beat him in HOTS; that said, the Zerg has a 2-1 series edge over the Protoss and I have a difficult time seeing Lilbow besting him in a BO7, so I'll stick with the odds; if Aligulac is correct about Bunny he is a huge underdog (25%).
Both Aligulac and I have Hydra winning (this prediction matches mine from before).
This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)
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