- News by: Julian Xu

Hello CSL fans, and welcome to another update of what’s going on east of the Mississippi (and north of the Great Lakes?)! I apologize for these late reports, this week I blame it on Rutgers and George Mason waiting until Friday to finish their match. Just kidding, it’s my own fault, and I’ll promise to be more on time next week.

It was a relatively calm week for Division 1. None of the top teams, Tufts (5-0), UOttawa (5-1), McGill (5-1), or MIT (4-1) played each other this week, so they are all still on even footing at the top of their standings. Although technically Harvard (2-3) still has a chance of making it to the playoffs if the stars miraculously align for them (and the entire Tufts CSL team gets abducted by the Xel’Naga), their 1-3 loss to McGill this week was not a fortuitous sign. Harvard’s spencer (Spencer Liang) seems to be the sole bright spot on their team, improving to a 6-1 individual record after picking up the team’s only win in their loss to McGill. The rest of the Harvard team minus spencer is now a combined 2-10. Next week, watch out for MIT vs. McGill!

The fight for a playoff spot in Division 2 is much more competitive. No one is undefeated anymore, and although Princeton (5-1) is in the lead after a 3-0 drubbing of Cornell (3-2), 5 other teams with 2 losses each are trailing right behind. This week the Rutgers team (4-2) banned all its members from playing DotA*, and as a result, bounced back from a 2 game losing streak with a crucial 3-1 victory over George Mason (3-2). One of the surprises in this league this season has to be Binghamton (3-2), a team that finished at the bottom of its division only 1 season ago. They are moving up in the standings after having defeated Yale this week, and if they can get through Cornell next week, they will be in an excellent position to secure a playoff spot.

While the playoff spots in Divisions 1 and 2 are still being widely contested, the outlook in Division 3 is a bit clearer. UWaterloo (5-0) is currently number 1 and will most likely stay on top, since they already have wins over the second and third place teams in the division, UToronto and Ryerson (both at 4-1). Meanwhile, at 3-2 and tied for fourth place are McMaster and the veterans Carnegie Mellon, who are in their 3rd straight season of CSL (haha sorry guys about last time). Although they both have a chance of breaking into a playoff spot, it will be difficult task because they both still have UToronto and UWaterloo left to play in the upcoming weeks. Prove me wrong!

The six weeks of CSL so far for Division 4 has been a snoozefest. With multiple teams dropping out of the league, many walkovers and no-shows, imbalanced teams, and scheduling that has resulted in 3 teams that are still undefeated (Duke, Emory, and Georgia Tech), it’s a challenge to find anything noteworthy to talk about here. So I won’t. Fortunately, the next few weeks shows promise – the 3 top teams will have to play each other at some point, and perhaps then we’ll finally get to see some action.

*Not confirmed to be true