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The last straight line before the finals is launched! They are now only four and the fight for the Finals will be open tonight. Three favorites are set at the rendezvous and a slightly less expected guest comes knocking at the door. Let's see right away what is at stake in these two semifinals. Schedule Please note that the Playoff structure has been shortened of what was originally planned, and therefore the originally provided Playoff schedule is not valid. Here is the updated schedule: RO16: 22.1-29.1.2023 Quarterfinals: 30.1-7.2.2023 Semifinals: 9.-16.2.2023 Finals: 19.-23.2.2023 Cheeky Grinders (1) vs Deggendorfer SC Esports (6) The big favorite against the underdog, that's how we could sum up this series which will face two teams both from Group 2. Cheeky Grinders is a team whose path so far has left nothing to chance. Beaten in regular time by only two teams during the regular time, Predators and Pirates eSports, the Finnish players seemed unfazed. Their first two rounds of playoffs were no less tumultuous with a 4-0 victory against the Swiss of Ambri then 4-1 against the Austrian team of Pustertal. Facing them are the Germans of Deggendorfer. In itself their presence at this stage of the competition is not necessarily a surprise. Their regular season has been well controlled even though their record of 15-7-2 is far from that of their opponents, 20-2-2. This is an experienced team that knew how to thwart the torturous traps of the first round of the playoffs where Fenris Wolves almost eliminated them and they had to go through the terrible ordeal of match 7. And that's probably what the team's mind forged because the next round, paradoxically, seemed simpler. Faced with Predators who had preceded them during the regular season, the Germans seemed to experience less difficulty. During their oppositions in season, the Finns won twice, 3-1 then 7-4. This is one more argument that allows us to estimate that Cheeky Grinders will win a ticket to the final. Prediction: 4-2 for Cheeky Grinders HC Korobka (2) vs Hannover Indians eSports (3) Here again we have two teams from the same group which will confront each other. But this time around things don't seem as readable as in the previous series. Between Korobka and their dazzling start, and Hannover and their consistency, it is very difficult to say who will come out of it the most clearly in this opposition. Both are teams with a very similar profile. Two teams that score a lot and concede a relatively low number of goals. For each of them it is clearly the offensive game that gives them arguments and we know that in the playoffs it is the defenses that have arguments to oppose. It should in no way be surprising if the series were to continue until a final game 7. If for each the first round of the playoffs was relatively calm, on the other hand the quarter-finals were epic for both teams. Korobka had to fight against the Swedes of MoDo who never made it easy for them and it was only after an undecided match 7 that the decision was made. Hannover for their part were heroic in reversing a negative trend and winning three games in a row. Led 1-3 by Olten, the Germans were able to recover and went to seek their qualification with the sweat of their brow, also in a match 7. Both teams know how to hit the scoreboard as we know, but whichever of the two best preserves its cage will have its place in the final. Prediction: 4-3 for Korobka

After some of the biggest games to date here at SportsGamer, we have crowned our NACL '23 Winter Champions - Entourage! We were expecting to see a Finals series unlike anything else seen before, with two teams going back-and-forth, potentially all the way in a seven game series, however, Entourage had different plans. While the short lived series was statistically very close, it was just a story of everything going right for Entourage, and in turn, everything going wrong for Scary Hours. In the end, the Champions prevailed with a sweep in the series! With their Championship, not only does Entourage secure the largest share of the 6 000€ prize pool, but they also punch their ticket to the inaugural World Finals in Helsinki, Finland on February 25th.  Entourage's road to the championship: #2 seed with the record 17-0-3 Round 1: bye Round 2: vs Supremacy (14) 4-0 Quarterfinals: vs The Underdogs (9) 4-1 Semifinals: vs One Unit (4) 4-2 Finals: vs Scary Hours (1) 4-0 The winning roster: GOALTENDERS #11 @IvanDelosh (xDelee) #79 @Rampage l79l DEFENSEMEN #8 @Doughty x i8i (A) #37 @Time2shineee #65 @Dumoulin65 FORWARDS #27 @BoilyHP #71 @hxndry (C) #86 @xDeath (Ethancy) #93 @gilly (A) We managed to reach out to the Entourage captain Lucas @hxndry Hendry amidst all the celebration: What was going through your mind in those closing moments of the game?  Any time there's an overtime between two great teams, the littlest things can end up making the big difference. As you saw, we were throwing punches back and forth in overtime and I'm so happy with how that turned out. We didn't wanna go any longer with how sweaty those games were! How has all of this success come together for Entourage over the past year? We definitely knew the talent was there when building this roster and as I said in one of the pregame interviews, we can take our losses and roll with them. We've played for about nine months now and just keep getting better and better! What's your preparation going to be ahead of the World Finals? We're definitely going to have to do some scouting on the EU teams and watch those Semifinals they're playing in right now. We'll have to try to pick up on some of the tendencies those guys have and see through the differences between the EU and NA game. It'll be achange of pace adjusting to that playstyle but we're excited to finally get to play those guys.  On behalf of the entire SportsGamer community, we congratulate the Champions and extend a warm thank you to all participants!

The time has come to see the rest of the playoffs. The presentation is still succinct but will be a more extensive coverage for the Semifinals. Schedule Please note that the Playoff structure has been shortened of what was originally planned, and therefore the originally provided Playoff schedule is not valid. Here is the updated schedule: RO32: 22.1.-29.1.2023 RO16: 30.1-7.2.2023 Quarterfinals: 9.-16.2.2023 Semifinals: 19.-23.2.2023 Finals: 26.2.-1.3.2023 During the previous round, two significant performances were observed. First the sensation came from the elimination of Rusty Bulls, leader of the regular season by Russian Lightning, 3-2. The other feat of arms is to be credited to Dompa HC who got rid of the number 3 seed, The Real Rookies, 3-1. We also remember the sweep imposed by Nbg Ice Tigers 2 (10) at LETTLAND (7). Find the matchups here: Pirati Chomutov Academy (2) vs Russian Lightning (19) Kanukit (4) vs Dompa HC (15) Belissimo (5) vs Nbg Ice Tigers 2 (10) Old Hogs (6) vs EASHL Russian (8)

The NACL '23 Winter Finals will be played in full tonight, and we're extremely excited to see two prestigious teams that have been able to compete at a high level for a very long time. Both the #1 seed Scary Hours and the #2 seed Entourage have some big titles under their belts already, but now the stakes are higher than ever and they'll be playing to punch their ticket to the inaugural World Finals in Helsinki on February 25th. Make sure to also read our full NACL '23 Winter Finals Preview before we go live tonight. Scary Hours (1) vs Entourage (2) TOP SCORER Harley @Sitballs (Sitful-_-) Sitko 18 GP, 22+22=44 vs Ethan @xDeath (Ethancy) Macdonald 15 GP, 23+26=49 GOALTENDER Justin @Bardown Beauty Turner 13 GP, 11 W, 83,76 SV%, 1.46 GAA, 2 SO vs Justin @Rampage l79l Horn 15 GP, 12 W, 81,44 SV%, 2.07 GAA, 2 SO REGULAR SEASON RECORD 20-1-1 vs 17-0-3 Ahead of the big games we reached out to Entourage owner and captain Lucas @hxndry Hendry, who is heading into the Finals in good spirits, very confident in his own team. Can you go over your history with Scary Hours and how your most recent games have gone? Entourage has been around since 2019 and this team is a new roster built in May. We've played a bunch against the guys in Scary Hours under different names through the years but the latest competitive games probably date back to the Semifinals in Caps Gaming 2022, where the series ended 3-1 for Scary Hours. We've done a lot of work since then and are confident we can take them this time. We were actually scheduled to play them last Wednesday, but decided to pull a strategic forfeit to not show them any of our game ahead of the NACL Finals. What would you say is the essence of success for Entourage? I'd say we have a bunch of talent obviously. The entire roster is Top 3 in North America on their respective positions, we practice a lot and scrim a couple of times a week on top of the tournaments going on. A big thing is that we can handle the inevitable losses and learn from them. The mindset of just being the best and not settling for anything else is really the driving force. Is there any specific player that has been particularly important for you guys during the NACL '23 Winter season? Honestly I'd say our D-pair @Doughty x i8i and @Dumoulin65. They really are are the backbone of our team and just levels ahead of everyone else on their positions. They're able to effortlessly control the whole defense and jump in on the offense with the skill they have back there. Join us tonight for the Finals series at twitch.tv/SportsGamerGG! We'll be going live at 7:30PM ET with NHL 23 X-Factor Edition Xbox Game Code giveaways after every game!

SportsGamers, We're down to the top four teams in the ECL '23 Winter Elite division and with that, these teams are only eight wins away from a title, and a spot in the inaugural World Finals! This round will offer some highly exciting action and a classic between hREDS and Frölunda HC. which one of these teams will be the first to claim a spot in the Finals? Schedule Quarterfinals: 25.1-1.2.2023 Semifinals: 5-8.2.2023 Finals: 24.2.2023 (Live in Helsinki) Tunnel Vision  (1)  vs JYP Jyväskylä  (5) TOP SCORER Arttu @laitineen64 Laitinen 5 GP, 5+6=11 vs Santeri @indi969 Pendolin 5 GP, 5+4=9 GOALTENDER Niklas @uhNikke Nieminen 5 GP, 4 W, 80,43 SV%, 1.8 GAA, 1 SO vs Kasper @Kaz_zu Ramstedt 5 GP, 4 W, 84,48 SV%, 1.8 GAA, 2 SO REGULAR SEASON RECORD 27-0-3 vs 18-9-3 REGULAR SEASON SERIES 7-2, 7-3 When these two teams clashed in the regular season, the story was very lopsided, and Tunnel Vision managed to have their way with JYP in two high-scoring victories. While it seemed like JYP has struggled a bit with defensive collapses throughout the regular season, they've really tightened things up in the Playoffs and managed to wear out Reality Check HC in the Quarterfinals. Tunnel Vision also had no issue overcoming JANO in their Quarterfinals matchup. Thus far, neither of these teams have been forced to flex all of their muscles, and we can expect the pace to pick up even more moving forward, but Tunnel Vision will more than likely be better accustomed to the kind of hockey that it will take to win this series, and they'll be able to play on the chemistry of their core and ride the hot blade that Arttu @laitineen64 Laitinen has been having all season long. Kasper @Kaz_zu Ramstedt was excellent for JYP in their Quarterfinals matchup and even secured some wins for the club with massive saves in the dying seconds of the game, whereas Niklas @uhNikke Nieminen still has some room to improve for Tunnel Vision.  Prediction: 4-1, Tunnel Vision.   hREDS  (2) vs Frölunda HC  (3) TOP SCORER (Playoffs) Niklas @NikkeDangles Tukiainen 4 GP, 2+5=7 vs Tuukka @FlyerKungen Kuha 4 GP, 4+7=11 GOALTENDER (Playoffs) Filip @Faze91- Azri 4 GP, 4 W, 92,31 SV%, 0.75 GAA, 2 SO vs Casper @ICappeI Lundgren 4 GP, 4 W, 94,39 SV%, 0.5 GAA, 3 SO REGULAR SEASON RECORD 24-4-2 vs 22-4-4 REGULAR SEASON SERIES 1-3, 3-2 We're in for a real treat in these Semifinals as hREDS and Frölunda HC are about to clash. These are two greats of the game and while in recent years, hREDS have been the torchbearers on the big stages, Frölunda HC have never stopped their grind, and this season they are looking better than ever on the prowl for another big title. Is this the time they'll be able to trample that hREDS dynasty? A look in the crease reveals two real legends of the position, but interestingly enough, neither Casper @ICappeI Lundgren or Filip @Faze91- Azri managed to quite reach their top level in the regular season. However, they've both made a really quick turnaround and picked up their game in impressive fashion. With three shutouts in four games played and a high-flying 94,29 SV%, Cappe is tough to beat for the best goalie in the Playoffs at this moment, but Faze will certainly look to give him a run for his money.  Statistically, this will be one of those series that could very well end up going all the way, and split points in the regular season indicate something in that direction too. Both of these teams know each other very well, so expect to see tight checking and a bit of a slower start to the series.  Prediction: 4-3, hREDS.   Join us for the first Semifinals gameday TONIGHT at Twitch.tv/SportsGamerGG! Both series will see their start, and we'll really be able to see in which direction these matchups start moving.