REIGNING two-time champion Lyceum rolled its way as Jose Rizal University, Arellano U and College of St. Benilde made surprise entries to the Final Four of the Collegiate Center Championship (CCC) Season 3 under its mother company Collegiate Center for Esports (CCE).
The Pirate Esports topped the elimination round with a 7-1 card before making short work of the No. 4 seed Perpetual Help 2-0 in the upper bracket playoffs to headline the semis cast.
Revelation squad Jose Rizal U, which came in second in a major turnaround this season with a similar 7-1 card, needed three games to dispatch No. 3 seed San Sebastian College in the other upper bracket pairing.
Higher seeds San Sebastian and Perpetual, in stunning fashion, crashed out of contention in the lower bracket as Arellano and CSB pulled off upsets to gatecrash their way to the semis.
The No. 7 seed Arellano ran away with a dominant win in Game 3 over San Sebastian, the Season 1 runner-up, as No. 5 CSB completed a reverse sweep of Perpetual to complete the Final Four cast of the fastest growing Esports collegiate league backed by Fantech, Converge, and Xiaomi.
Lyceum takes on JRU in the upper bracket while Arellano and CSB duke it out in the lower bracket of the semis.
The semis and grand finals of the prestigious tourney, led by chairman Stanley Lao, president Waiyip Chong, chairman emeritus Peter Cayco, general manager Jay Recto and lead project manager Franz Abrenica, will be held live at the red carpet of the inaugural Philippine GameDev Expo (PGDX) in Pasay City on Aug. 19 and 20, respectively.
As good as advertised, the Pirate Esports met little to no resistance in barging to their third straight Final Four appearance behind the lead of two-time MVP Mark “Mark” Kenneth Delos Reyes and breakout start Em Jhay “Alas4Spade” Cabradilla.
