Overwatch League 2020 Week 5: New York Excelsior's Top Plays, Prize Money

McCree, Widowmaker, Reinhardt and Moira all took some personal time off in Week 5. And, in their stead, a chaotic array of 2020 dive compositions stormed into the workplace and wrought absolute havoc.

There was some double-shield too, centered around Orisa and Sigma, but dive is what the people want and, mostly, what the people got. Tracer, Winston and Zenyatta—oh my!

The Overwatch League's fifth week marks the debut of hero bans and the cementing of the concrete jungle's DPS duo. I've been a fervent proponent of the Nenne and Libero DPS line for the New York Excelsior, and that duo, following its debut in Week 4, emphatically proved its superiority in Week 5.

Excelsior tried out other DPS rotations for the first three weeks, spanning some combination of Nenne, Saebyeolbe and Whoru. In Week 5, they celebrated the return of Tracer by giving SBB the start over Nenne—and quickly lost the first map 0-2.

Through five weeks, Nenne and Libero are 6-0 on maps when playing together. The team's other DPS rotations are a combined 10-5. Excelsior can roll no matter who they start, but it's clear which DPS duo shifts them into a higher gear.

NYXL was the most impressive squad this week, firmly putting the team back in the top tier of contention for a fat slice of the OWL's $5 million prize pie. But, while the Excelsior silently strolled into and out of the week without Twitter trash talk or a postgame interview, the rest of the league got to try walking the walk after talking their talk.

The bottom-ranked Houston Outlaws backed up their braggadocio, and the top-tier Philadelphia Fusion failed into new facial hair. The Excelsior, meanwhile, quietly extinguished an East Coast rivalry with the Washington Justice, in D.C. no less, before they could even become a real talking point.

Here's how the first week of hero bans shook out at Washington's sold-out "Battle for the East Coast" homestand.

Saturday, March 7

Toronto Defiant 1-3 Florida Mayhem

Paris Eternal 0-3 Houston Outlaws

Boston Uprising 1-3 Washington Justice

Sunday, March 8

Paris Eternal 3-2 Philadelphia Fusion

New York Excelsior 3-1 Washington Justice

Boston Uprising 0-3 Atlanta Reign

Full schedule and standings available here.

Saturday, March 7

The Outlaws have been considered trash-tier, but the meta shifted, and their attitude did too. Before Saturday's match against the upsurging Eternal, assistant coach Dream tweeted:

"in case anyone was wondering, we will win tomorrow

"another week where we are better at all 6 positions, Paris is good but we are locked in and playing well

"no one can stop us"

Memes became dreams as Houston 3-0'd the Eternal in a new meta that better fits its players' talents. Dream quickly followed up with a succinct "told you."

Set to face Paris on Sunday, the Fusion's Poko spilled Dream's copypasta onto his own Twitter—a second serving of sauce after he bet his French compatriots on the Eternal that the losing team would need to field a mustache during the Paris homestand in Week 10.

Sunday, March 8

Tracer, Soldier, Winston, D.Va, Zenyatta, Brigitte. The OWL settled onto a mirror match between the Eternal and Fusion, using a new, majestic quasi-dive composition after dabbling in an assortment of somewhat sloppy compositions throughout the first day of Week 5.

It was beautiful. On Saturday, the Eternal mucked about and combined Soon or Xzi with Nicogdh. On Sunday, they came to their senses, put NoSmite on Winston (instead of the Reinhardt-prone BenBest), locked Soon onto Tracer and paired him with a devastatingly accurate Xzi, who dominated on both Hanzo and Soldier.

The Eternal went up 2-0, setting a new record for Junkertown attack time in the process, before the Fusion came back and forced a fifth map. Paris ended up clutching it out in an absurd overtime fight, sending the Fusion home with tails between their legs, peach fuzz growing upon their upper lips and a sudden urge to pull out the markers and re-circle March 25 on their calendars—the day that rookie DPS Heesu turns 18 and can join MVP-favorite Carpe on stage.

After an incredible five-mapper, fans at the sold-out venue in Washington D.C. then got to lose their minds as the Justice demolished the first match against the Excelsior. Then New York subbed Nenne in, and the gracious guests turned into ferocious squatters.

The DPS duo makes perfect sense: Libero is an inventive, versatile projectile DPS player, and Nenne is a nasty hitscan. And they tore apart the Justice with an abundance of space provided by Mano and Hotba's tank-line flexibility—as the team aggressively shifted from dive to bunker and back like a New York transplant bouncing between bars during SantaCon.

Still, Season 1 MVP Jjonak had the play of the weekend. The flex support niftily switched off Brigitte and onto Ana and, within literally two seconds of the swap, landed a fight-winning sleep dart onto Washington's DPS Stratus.

After an uncharacteristically (for the regular season at least) shaky start to the year, NYXL is looking like a title contender again.

For the cherry on a wild weekend of Overwatch, the final match between the Reign and Uprising featured highlight plays from the fan-favorite DPS rookie Jerry and the deadly debut of one of the league's most highly anticipated rookie DPS's: Atlanta's Edison.

As for the Excelsior, like their team and city's "Ever upward" mantra, they're dissatisfied and focused on what's next. The team took to Twitter to speak up on behalf of its players after the match: "We didn't get a chance to talk on stage so here it is: We're sorry we didn't do with a 3-0. We'll make sure to practice more and come back stronger."