Here are your 2020 NHL GWC Regional Champions!

NHLGamers,

During this past week the NHLGWC regional finals and in that also the final events of the GWC season were completed. Due to the worldwide pandemic situation, all live events were cancelled and with that also the grand finals will be absent this year. Instead, fans around the world got to enjoy the play of our regional finalists in what would be some incredibly high stakes regional finals that we would cap off by crowning three regional champions - one in Canada, one in Europe, one in the US. Each of the regional champions took home a total of $10,000 USD and runner-ups earned a hefty slice of prize money with $2,500 USD.

Here are your 2020 NHLGWC regional champions:

🇨🇦 Canada: Justin @Regs84 Reguly

🇺🇸 US: Josh @OFs Fuss

🇪🇺 Europe: Arttu @Artuzio Mustila

Artuzio had a massive comeback year after a somewhat disappointing showing in the 2018 NHLGWC finals and came back determined to show his doubters this time around. The long time gamer based in Tampere, Finland did so in style and ended up beating Roni @MrNipsuli Kajan in the finals and claiming the EU regional championship. In the US regionals, OFs_HK showed up big and was something of a surprising winner as he managed to overcome the reigning world champion Matthew @TSCCookie Gutkoski in a thrilling final series! Our Canadian gamers brought on a show this year, but it was eventually two very familiar guys who fought for the title at the end, Regs and Matthew @YungGren Grenier went head-to-head in the final series, with Regs eventually walking away as the victor.

We got a hold of the European champion Artuzio for a short interview:

In 2018 you made a run all the way to the Grand Finals in Vegas. Did you utilize the experience and how have you developed in the last two years?
"In Vegas i wasn't a consistent player. My offense was good back then but the defensive side needed improvements. After the 2018 GWC I reviewed my game and found some points on which to improve and since then, I've layed more focus on strategic defense and the hitting game, which i feel has been a great improvement for me."

Which opponent do you think was the hardest this year?
"Without a doubt @PleeMaker. I know his style very well, but he's always so dangerous, you really need to pay attention on defense in order to win.

In both semifinal games, it looked like Plee was close to making a comeback, how did you stay calm during those moments?
"I've tried to play a lot of wager games and smaller tourneys this year in order to improve my work under pressure and I feel like it's really paid off, just check the scoreboards!"

Finally, what are you going to do with the prize money?
"Haven't decided yet, so it'll be put into savings for starters."