Last weekend’s Get On My Level 2018 represented some of the highest-level Smash ever played in Canada. Featuring heavy hitters in both the Super Smash Bros. Melee and Smash 4 brackets, the event was riveting from start to finish.
The Melee bracket was marked by stunning upsets from the first round of pools, as Zain “Zain” Naghmi fell 2-1 to 2013/2014 SSBMRank top 100 player Kevin “Hyprid” Bandel. Hyprid, a former NorCal Marth and current Toronto resident, never made it higher than 95th on SSBMRank, but was able to take advantage of Zain’s Marth weakness to defeat the godslaying MD/VA No. 1.
In a long and grueling loser’s run, Zain was able to run all the way to 5th place after his pools loss, defeating top names such as Edgard “n0ne” Sheleby, Dajuan “Shroomed” McDaniel, and Zachary “SFAT” Cordoni on his way. The lower half of the event’s Melee top 8 was rounded out by SFAT, James “Swedish Delight” Liu, and Masaya “aMSa” Chikamoto. In the top 4 of the bracket, Jeffrey “Axe” Williamson continued his winning streak over Jason “Mew2King” Zimmerman in Loser’s Semi-Finals, despite the Smash Summit 6 winner’s attempt to stymie his progress using uncommon character picks (for him) such as Jigglypuff and Fox.
In Loser’s Finals, Axe was quickly dispatched by Juan “Hungrybox” Debiedma, who had suffered a devastating loss at the hands of Justin “Plup” McGrath in Winner’s Finals. After defeating Axe, Hungrybox moved on to face Plup in Grand Finals, stunning the crowd with his laser powershields and rock-solid punish game. At the beginning of Grand Finals, Plup looked to be playing in good form, and the Canadian crowd began to chant “He’s Shook,” referring to Hungrybox. However, this chant seemed to light a fire under the Jigglypuff main, who brought it all the way back to reset the bracket 3-2 and then win the event with a 3-1 victory in the second set of Grand Finals. After Smash Summit 6 turned the Melee world upside down, GOML 2018 was a quick reminder that Hungrybox remains the man to beat.
Though he fell short of top 8, Kurtis “Moky” Pratt deserves mention for being the event’s top-placing Canadian. The stylish Fox player upset top European Mustafa “Ice” Akcakaya in winner’s bracket on his way to a ninth-place finish.
In Smash 4, Leonardo “MkLeo” Lopez Perez reigned supreme, taking his second consecutive major Grand Finals over Nairoby “Nairo” Quezada. Coming out of loser’s bracket, Nairo was able to clutch out the reset thanks to an unorthodox Bowser pick, but fell to MkLeo’s Cloud in the second set of Grand Finals. The event’s top 8 was rounded out by Tamim “Mistake” Omary, Rei “komorikiri” Furukawa, Samuel “Dabuz” Buzby, Bharat “Lima” Chintapall, and Gavin “Tweek” Dempsey. The remainder of GOML 2018’s Smash 4 bracket was riddled with upsets, as players such as Jason “ANTi” Bates and Griffin “Fatality” Miller fell to lower-ranked players. Notably, French No. 1 William “Glutonny” Belaid made a rare stateside appearance, defeating Fatality and top NorCal Meta Knight Shoaib “DSS” Rasooli.
