Originally posted at https://www.echofox.gg/news/sonicfox-and-saint-secure-first-place-at-vsfighting
With EVO just around the corner, players are looking to gain momentum going into the major event of the year. Players from all over the world traveled to Birmingham, England for VSFighting 2018. Those players included Echo Fox players like Choi “Saint” Jinwoo, Kim “JDCR” Hyun Jin, Justin Wong, Momochi, Dominique “SonicFox” McLean, and Jon “dekillsage” Coello. Will Echo Fox make a huge impact and make their mark going into EVO?
Street Fighter V: Arcade Edition has been a competitive year for all players. One player has not stood out this year like Victor “Punk” Woodley did last year. In VSFighting, however, a beast came out of the ashes to rise above the rest. Echo Fox’s Justin Wong qualified for top eight in the loser’s bracket against Team Liquid’s John Takeuchi. They fought in a close match where Justin came out victorious. He faced NASR’s Adel “Big Bird” Anouche and defeated him in four games. His next opponent was Sim “NL” Gun from UYU. This year, UYU had a great year in fighting games from Street Fighter V to Tekken 7. Like his match against John Takeuchi, Justin had a close match with NL going to five games. NL still riding on momentum, defeated Justin, and sent him home. The winner of SFV was Daigo “The Beast” Umehara, who won his first championship since last year at E-Sports Festival Hong Kong 2017.
Tekken 7 has been a ride for Saint and JDCR. Last year, they were undoubtedly the top two players in Tekken. This year, UYU has been on top of the Tekken scene with players Sang-hyun “JeonDDing” Jeon and Byeong Mun “Qudans” Son. Saint and JDCR look to regain their winning ways in VSFighting. Both Echo Fox players qualified for the winner’s bracket but had to go against each other in the first match. Saint was on a roll last weekend and defeated JDCR, sending him to the loser’s bracket. JDCR was on his way to get to loser’s finals until he fought against Mu-jong “Kkokkoma” Kim. Kkokkoma has been trending upwards in the standings in previous events. In his match against JDCR, he was able to take him down in two games. Saint was the remaining Echo Fox player, where he qualified for grand finals after taking down JeonDDing. Kkokkoma was able to defeat JeonDDing in the loser’s finals. Saint appeared to find his groove again with JACK-7 and defeated Kkokkoma in a close five-game series to win the championship for Tekken 7.
Dragonball FighterZ is a story of SonicFox versus the Japanese since the game’s release. In particular, he’s had issues with CYCLOPS’ Goichi “GO1” Kishida and Ryo “Dogura” Nozaki. After a disappointing finish at CEO 2018, SonicFox looks to regain momentum heading into EVO. He went into the top eight in the winner’s bracket against Naoki “moke” Nakayama, who is struggling as of late. SonicFox defeated moke, then his arch nemesis, GO1 in a five-game series to get into the grand finals. GO1 and Dogura duked it out in the loser’s finals where Dogura sent GO1 packing. In the grand finals, SonicFox called himself the champ once again after he defeated Dogura in four games.
With EVO setting in, Echo Fox looks to go into the major with a lot of confidence. EVO starts on August 3rd in Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, Nevada. Stay tuned for more at live.echofox.gg.
