Atlanta, Ga. – This Saturday the Cougar Esports team finished as the runner-up in the Grand Finals for the American Video Game League (AVGL) Community League of Legends Tournament. The Cougars took to main stage at DreamHack Atlanta to face Harrisburg University's Storm Esports squad, falling 2-0 in the best-of-three series.
 
The Cougars secured their spot in the AVGL Grand Finals after besting the competition of over ninety other collegiate teams in the tournament.
 
The Cougars were not in full form for the tournament and lacked their starting top laner. Ian "MistyStumpey" Alexander was occupied competing at the 2019 LCS Scouting Grounds tournament in Los Angeles, California. Scouting Grounds is an annual event for the top up-and-coming amateur players from North America to compete in front of professional teams.
 
Throughout the series, the Cougars struggled to maintain map control and allowed Harrisburg to net every neutral objective on the map in both games. Harrisburg was first on the board in game one. Most of the early action centered around bot lane and the dragon pit. The Cougars drafted a team comp built for team fighting and locking down targets with hard crowd control, but they struggled to find the right team fights and often over reached. Harrisburg was quick to punish Columbia for overstepping with the champions Thresh and Akali. Ultimately, the Cougars were unable to dig themselves out of the deficit and Harrisburg clenched game one.
 
The Cougars found some success in game two. Every team fight seemed to ride on a knife's edge and could have gone either way. Cougar bot lane player Andrew "AndyBendy" Forman had a strong performance on the champion Ezreal. He did a fantastic job avoiding ganks and pumping out poke damage in team fights. Unfortunately, on the opposite side of the map Harrisburg's top laner was racking up a sizeable gold advantage. Later in the game, the Cougars tried to collapse on a split push in the bot lane that would end up costing them the Baron objective. The misplay ultimately cost them the game and the series.
 
Didn't see the game live? Watch Saturday's broadcast her Twitch.tv/DreamHack.

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