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How Turkey’s SuperMassive won our hearts

Riot·5/8/2016, 7:19:09 AM·1 votes·13,313 views

Turkey's SuperMassive may have been the first team to bow out of the 2016 Mid-Season Invitational, but their impact on the tournament, and our audience, will last long after the curtain call here in Shanghai.

Even the Chinese audience cheered that little bit louder when the underdogs took to the stage, provided they weren’t playing against China’s own Royal Never Give Up. Everyone was eager to see what this freshman team with nothing to lose could prove against the regional giants that towered over them.

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SuperMassive's 1-9 results may not look good on paper -- but anyone watching their games would have seen a competitive team taking kills, pressing advantages, and proving that on a mechanical level they could compete with the best teams in the world.

The only thing that seemed to hamstring them was some poor decision making, but that’s something to be expected for team that’s only been playing together for five months. For SuperMassive’s ADC Achuu, it’s all a learning process.

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“I think the biggest gap in this tournament for us was our team play. It shows that we're a new team, only five months old," Achuu says. "So it's kind of hard for us to compete with the teams that are one, two, three years old like SKTelecom and CLG. They've been around a long time and have a lot of experience.”

For such a young team, they showed staggering improvement throughout MSI 2016 and even managed to take a thoroughly convincing win off North America's Counter Logic Gaming. During that game, the world saw why Dumbledoge should have Bard permabanned against him and how Achuu himself is a phenomenally gifted ADC -- especially for someone who only started playing professionally five months ago.

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“I became a pro five months ago. And I've slowly but surely improved my skill and mechanics throughout the Split," Achuu explains, going on to admit that he's had a "pretty good" tournament here at MSI.  "My KDA's not so good, but at least I pulled off some good CS numbers and damage output during the games. So I'm fairly happy with my performance here.”

“I even took down CLG's MVP [Stixxay] quite convincingly in our first match, so hopefully they'll remember me in NA!”

SuperMassive have represented themselves, and Turkey, with pride. They took their defeats with grace and their victories with humility. They knew the odds were against them, but still stepped onto the stage here in Shanghai with confidence and smiles on their faces. They’re slowly changing what it means to be a Wildcard team -- so that next time they step out on the international stage (and there will be a next time) they’ll be looked at with the respect they earned here in Shanghai.

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“Even though we lost a lot of games, I don't really get frustrated about it," says Achuu. "I'm always leaving the stage with a smile, every time. I think it's a great experience, especially since even five months ago, I was the one watching this type of thing. Now I'm playing against them!”

Achuu continued, “I think for Worlds, or next year, if we stick as a team, we'll put up even a better fight than we did already.”

You can keep following the MSI journey here at Lolesports and show Turkey some love on twitter with #MSI2016.

11 Comments

Eleshakai5/8/2016, 2:43:30 PM5 votes

I think we're only a year or so away from a time when coming from an IWC region isn't a matter of 'who can they take that single upset victory off of'... these regions are growing and while it's a long time before I think they'll start winning the whole thing, if ever... I wouldn't be surprised if we started seeing some of these teams make the bracket stage of events within the next few years.

AceOfEpix5/8/2016, 7:16:45 PM1 votes

Dumbledoge > World

Goodwine5/8/2016, 8:39:40 PM1 votes

You also have to consider that they don't have the best e-sports infrastructure, and yet they still showed some awesome games :o

OutlawHunter5/8/2016, 10:33:19 PM1 votes

doesnt win mine

OG Frozen Salad5/9/2016, 1:49:17 AM1 votes

Man the Uk team is so good :D Good Job UK! :D summoner 31

VictimEN5/9/2016, 2:16:49 PM1 votes

I have to agree with Eleshakai. Normally wildcard teams show some strong individual players and skirmish potential but generally fall apart later on in the game unless they can get a snowball rolling. While SuperMassive tended to fall behind later on, they didn't really seem to fall apart completely either. Also, they showed some strong play in most of their roles instead of relying on one standout player. They had far more close games than other wildcard teams IIRC. SM seemed legitimately good - while not generally as good as top teams from other regions, I don't think I'd be surprised to see them making playoff runs and having a chance at Worlds if they were an NA or EU team. Yeah, they're still behind, but only a few steps now - and gaining.

The most worrisome thing about them, is that despite how casters talk about how the big international tournaments are a great learning experience for IWC teams, we tend not to see repeat attendance from the same teams. I assume it's hard to keep a team together in areas without the full blown league structure - going back to seasons 1 and 2, while TSM, CLG, DIG and Curse stuck around, there were lots more teams that showed up for an MLG event or two and then fell apart. Let's hope SM can go the distance and show up at Worlds.

AWildCoconut5/17/2016, 6:27:41 PM1 votes

i honestly do not think turkey deserves this Garen summoner 21 [zombie-brand-facepalm]