Tundra Esports has won The International 11 Dota 2 tournament after beating Team Secret 3-0 in the final. The win grants the team the title of the best Dota 2 team in the world and a massive first place prize of at least $8,486,704 or ₱493,119,935.
Tundra Esports are your #TI11 Champions! 🎉 Congratulations to skiter, Nine, 33, Saksa, and Sneyking - dropping just one game during the entire Main Stage and taking the Grand Finals 3-0, they emerge victorious on their quest for the Aegis. pic.twitter.com/R1bhFziPq2
— The International (@dota2ti) October 30, 2022
Tundra — consisting from Position 1 to 5: skiter, Nine, 33, Saksa, Sneyking — completely dominated the 11th edition of TI from start to end: placing top of Group B during the group stage, then winning all their games in the upper bracket of the Main Event, kicking out OG, Team Aster, and Team Secret — consisting from Position 1 to 5: Crystallis, Nisha, Resolut1on, Zayac, Puppey — twice over. Moreover, this is the second time ever that a team has won 3-0 in the BO5 grand finals since Team Liquid beat Newbee in similar fashion in 2017.
Tundra went undefeated throughout the bracket stage of the competition, only losing four maps in the group stage and just one on the main stage. While recent years have seen a lot of underdogs win The International, this was a case of the best team fulfilling their destiny in impressive fashion.
Tundra entered the grand finals with confidence and a certain plan. They started out the first game letting though Nisha’s undefeated Leshrac, a hero that almost every other team feared and first banned against Secret — to which Tundra’s coach Aui_2000 commented that they wanted to test it out in the first game, and would adjust their strategy if they couldn’t beat it. But to Secret’s surprise, the unconventional picks of 33’s Tide Hunter and Saksa’s Hoodwink proved to be more challenging than expected, completely shutting down Crystallis’ Pudge, and created space for skiter’s Naga Siren to snowball.
After beating Team Secret 2-1 in the upper bracket final many expected Tundra to continue their dominance in the final and they certainly did. In game one Tundra let Team Secret have Leshrac, a hero they had been dominant on throughout the tournament, thinking that they had a counter to it. While some analysts questioned the decision it turned out to be the right one, as Tundra easily took the win to kick off the grand finals.
Game two was the same story, with Secret again taking the Leshrac and again Tundra beating it. Secret did get off to a better start in game two, making it a bit closer, but with Tundra picking Visage, Arc Warden and Chaos Knight the chaotic fights always favoured Tundra, and they went on to make it 2-0 just one game away from TI victory.
In game three Secret tried to play Tundra at their own game, taking the Naga Siren that Tundra had used throughout the tournament for themselves. They again picked Leshrac, despite losing both previous games with it and again it didn’t work. While this was the closest Secret got to winning a game, Tundra proved too strong, taking the final 3-0 to become TI champions.
Finally, there was a glimmer of hope in the early minutes of Game 3, when Nisha’s Naga Siren was farming well and hitting her item timings, while the opposite was happening with skiter’s Medusa. But this light was soon trampled upon by 33’s Beastmaster and Nine’s Pangolier, both of which fiercely disrupted the flow of Secret’s momentum, and gave their Medusa a chance to come back. At the end, a mid lane scrimmage that lasted 3 mins without any reset from Tundra not only proved just how much of a raid boss Medusa had become, but also how much the five champions put the T in teamwork.
