BTK’s sudden resurgence in the M3 World Championship shook the MLBB esports scene, as a Western team was finally able to make a massive breakthrough in a landscape dominated by Southeast Asian countries.
And they managed to do it without any coach, analyst, and manager.
In fact, the team only gelled together upon reaching the airport.
Though they made headlines with a massive upset against Blacklist International, they were left humbled by Onic PH in the upper bracket finals as the North American squad was easily overwhelmed.
And their superstar player, Michael “MobaZane” Cosgun admitted on his YouTube livestream that his experience of being swept by Onic PH had shaken him to the core.
“Onic really f***ed me up man,” he blatantly said.
Onic put the brakes on MobaZane run
MobaZane was very frank about how Onic gave him a hard time as they shut down his signature hero.
“They were so aggressive towards me, I just couldn’t do anything about it. They gave me Natan, which was my first and last Natan game in M3 and they just countered it so hard. They played that so well,” said the jungler.
But it wasn’t just countering his Natan that paved the victory for Onic PH. Even the deadly Pharsa and Natalia combo weakened the North American squad, especially in Games 1 and 2.
Allen Jedric “Baloyskie” Baloy’s Natalia was constantly harassing MobaZane’s jungle control, while the Pharsa from either Mark “Markyyyyy” Capacio and Jaylord “Hatred” Gonzales weakened BTK’s group ups.
“Natalia, Pharsa, we weren’t ready for that. We never saw that from them and generally there was like no way we were prepared for that. We never saw it before. We didn’t think it was that big of an issue,” he went on.
Plus, other two members in Onic’s ranks forced BTK in an uncomfortable position, and even Kairi “Kairi” Rayosdelsol’s impact was felt even after banning his hero pool.
It wouldn't have turned out any different if they'd gone a different route in the draft, MobaZane opined.
“Chickn said that their best player was Kairi and he wanted to ban all the jungle heroes and I just went with that. But even if we didn’t go with Chickn’s idea we wouldn’t have drafted better,” he explained.
Then came Dlarskie, with his Yu Zhong plus petrify combo, to hammer one more nail into the coffin.
“Dlarskie man on his Yu Zhong, every single time I jumped in, he was there with his f***ing petrify. I’ve never seen a more dedicated Yu Zhong save his petrify. We weren’t ready for that.”
BTK could've once again stunned Blacklist International
While the pre-match interview against Onic PH saw Cosgun say that Onic PH was “the weaker team” compared to Blacklist International, he said in hindsight that BTK did better against Blacklist.
“We had much easier time with Blacklist than vs. Onic. I do give Onic credit, we couldn’t beat them. We’re not ready at all. There was really no way we could prepare for something like that,” he said.
Cosgun then hinted that even Kiel “OHEB” Soriano had thought out loud that BTK could’ve beaten Blacklist at the lower bracket finals, "which was honestly really close."
“Even the MVP of M3, OHEB, he said like if we won that last game, we probably would’ve beaten them,” recalled MobaZane.
Yet even if they managed to go all the way to the finals, Cosgun doubted if they could finally slay the Filipino Hedgehogs.
“But if we did win that, I don’t think we would’ve beaten Onic. We just don’t have a good strategy against them. We would just be 2nd place.”
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