EVO 2009 results

Match notes

Grand Finals Matches 1 and 2:

• Match 1: Justin Wong (Abel, Boxer) defeats Daigo Umehara (Ryu), 3-2 •

Although it started off a little slow, to put in simply -- these games were electric. Justin selected Abel to open up the first game, something he said he would do after the American National Street Fighter IV Championships.

Justin believed his Abel would be a counter to Daigo's Ryu, but Umehara won first game convincingly.

After wards the crowd started chanting "Switch! Switch! Switch!" and Wong followed their advice and picked Balrog (the Boxer).

While some people didn't know that Justin Wong played Balrog, he actually set the Guinness World Record by winning 300 straight games with him at this year's E3.

Balrog is not a popular character over in Japan, but he is here in America, and it was speculated that Daigo wasn't highly familiar with this match, so it could end up being a good counter.

Justin opened up with two very convincing rounds to win game 2 and had pretty much a repeat performance in game 3. The crowd was absolutely loving his Balrog play. At this point Wong was up 2 games to 1.

In game 4, Daigo really started to adapt. Things weren't as easy for Wong and Daigo won the first round. Justin countered back and took the second round and right as he won, stood up, left his joystick behind, and starting trying to pump up thr crowd even more. He just got back to his seat right as the match was starting. This was a risky move, and Justin later made a mistake by trying to combo into Balrog's Headbutt even though Daigo was clearly blocking. Umehara punished him and won that set.

It's possible this was just a simple mistake that all players make, or that Justin may have taken himself out of his game a little bit by leaving his chair and getting the crowd going.

Regardless, it was now tied 2-2. Justin and Daigo both won one round each and it was match point for Umehara. Both players had a full Super meter to start round 3.

Daigo made some big mistakes here. He missed landing his Super, and also missed a Linked combo into his Shoryuken which Wong promptly punished, but Umehara was still able to fight back and drain Justin down to almost no life. But Justin made some clutch plays at the end and defeated Daigo in the last round to win the set 3-2.

• Match 2: Daigo Umehara (Ryu) defeats Justin Wong (Boxer), 3-2 •

Since Daigo hadn't lost before, Justin's victor counted as his first loss for this double elimination tournament, so the score reset and the first player to win three games would be the Evolution 2009 Street Fighter IV champion.

Umehara battled back with some very well played foot games and went up 1-0 in the match. Justin countered with some great play of his own to tie things up again at 1 game to 1.

Daigo again bounced back and won another set to go up 2 games to 1. He also won the next round, which put Justin at match point. Umehara started to do a bunch of Focus Attacks, seemingly without reason, almost to taunt Justin, or possibly get inside his head, but Wong kept his composure and ended up winning the next two rounds to tie the games at 2 a piece.

In the final game, Daigo made a few more plays than Justin and ended up pulling it out to win 3-2. After wards, both players shook hands and Daigo Umehara yet again added another Evolution Fighting Game Championship victory to his impressive win list.

4th Round Losers Bracket:
• Justin Wong (Rufus) defeats Ed Ma (Zangief, Akuma), 2-0. Ed Ma made a BIG surprise counter pick by selecting Zangief, because he normally plays an amazing Akuma. The collective opinion among many Street Fighter 4 players is that Zangief has a heavy advantage against Rufus, but Justin has strongly disagreed with that opinion and proved it on the big stage by winning two rounds in decisive fashion. Ed Ma quickly switched back to Akuma and there was a lot of back and forth play, both players had some good counters, but in what ended up being the final round the clock was ticking down and Wong made a strong play to win with almost no time left.

3rd Round Losers Bracket:
• Justin Wong (Rufus) defeats Sanford "Santhrax" Kelly (Akuma), 2-0. Justin was strong early on, but Sanford was able to bounce back and make it close for awhile. In the end, Wong had the decisive edge and made better plays down the stretch to win the set two games to zero.

2nd Round Losers Bracket:
• Justin Wong (Rufus) vs Long "ShadyK" Tran (Akuma), 2-0. Justin Wong had an outstanding opening round, but ShadyK bounced back in the next one with a Raging Demon and a good combo, but Justin avoided several fireballs and kept his cool with almost no power to win the first match. From that point, Justin was simply too good offensively for ShadyK to counter. Wong didn't give Shady much room to breathe and won the second game as well.

• Sanford "Santhrax" Kelly (Akuma) beat Eduardo "Vvv scrub" Perez-frangie (E. Honda) 2-1. Perez didn't seem comfortable with Balrog — who he usually chooses — and counter picked with Honda. Many people were very surprised by this move, but he again played a VERY aggressive style. Perez did well in the opening set, but made a few costly mistakes, one leading to a Raging Demon for Sanford's Akuma, which gave Santhrax the advantage. Still, Perez bounced back hard with a relentless offensive game to take advantage of Akuma's low stamina ranking. E. Honda used lots of Light Punches and his Hundred Hand Slap to hold his own, but towards the end, Sanford landed another Raging Demon, and was able to punish Perez for making a few mistakes and won.

2nd Round Winners Bracket:
• Daigo Umehara (Ryu) defeats Ed Ma (Akuma), 2-0. Daigo was very calculated in the first set, he picked his spots and beat Ed Ma convincingly in the opening game. In the second game, Ed Ma turtled quite a bit looking for an opening, and he found a couple to shake Daigo up, but Daigo's experience won out in the end and he took both games.

1st Round Losers Bracket:
• Long "ShadyK" Tran (Akuma) defeated Ricky Ortiz (Rufus), 2-0. ShadyK was very aggressive and also Ricky Ortiz accidentally did his Super and wasted all of his meter during a round, Shady took advantage and won the first game. Both players were taking turns with their offensive barrages in the second game, but ShadyK connected with some clutch uppercuts and took the set to eliminate Ricky Ortiz from the tournament.

• Sanford "Santhrax" Kelly (Cammy) defeats Takashi "Dan from Japan" Hukushi (Ryu), 2-0. Sanford took a slight surprise pick in Cammy, he usually plays Akuma. Rumor had it that Dan from Japan didn't know the console character fights well and that rumor proved to be true. Cammy started off by blowing through Ryu's projectiles multiple times and won the first match. In the second set, Sanford set up some great combos with the mini-wrecking ball Cammy. He really controlled the match and beat down Dan — who had previously had some VERY impressive showings earlier in the tournament.

1st Round Winners Bracket:
• Ed Ma (Akuma) defeats Eduardo "Vvv scrub" Perez-frangie (Boxer), 2-1. Ed Ma took big advantage of Perez's blocked and missed headbutts with Balrog and punished them heavily to take the first set. Ed Ma really picked his spots well, he attacked when it was smart to do so, but Perez's constant offense was too much for Ed Ma to overcome in the second set. But Ed Ma bounced back with more calculated play to take the third match, and Perez made some mistakes which Ed Ma fully took advantage of. It's possible that nerves caught up with Perez a bit because he made some mistakes he wasn't making in the earlier rounds.

• Daigo Umehara (Ryu) defeats Justin Wong (Abel), 2-0. The crowd was going crazy even before the button check started. Justin started off in a kick back style, which is unusual for Abel players. Justin attempted to play a heavy zoning game so he was in position to attack when he saw an opening he liked. Daigo got a feel for Justin's Abel after awhile and got more aggressive and scored some big combos to take the first set. Justin bounced back hard in the first round of the second set and picked Daigo apart. In the second round, Justin played zone, but missed a big combo. Daigo didn't miss his combo in return won round 2. Round 3 was very competitive, but Daigo pulled out a close one to win the 2nd game.

Match Notes

Grand Finals:
• Hung "Afro Legends" Nguyen (Boxer) defeats John Choi (Ryu) 3-2. This was a GREAT back and forth set. Choi started off by trying to keep his distance, but John later mixed it up and did some unexpected throws and landed some combos. But Afro was really the star here. He capitalized on mistakes by Choi, did a great job of staying patient and working his way inside and when he got there — he did a lot of damage and mixed up his game to keep John off balance.

4th Round Losers Bracket:
• John Choi (Ryu) beats Damien "Damdai" Dailidenas (Ken) 2-0. Choi had great zoning, spacing and footsies and really picked apart Damdai. Ken had some good set ups for this throw, but Choi's superior zone game won out in convincing fashion. Not to undersell what Damdei did here though, because in the earlier rounds he had some convincing victories over top competition.

3rd Round Losers Bracket:
• Damien "Damdai" Dailidenas (Zangief) defeats Graham Wolfe (Boxer) 2-1. Damdai definitely picked the counter character here, and while Graham very much hung tough, it's VERY difficult for Balrog to consistently beat Gief in this match up. Damdai nailed a lot of Lariats, did a good job setting up his Spinning Pilerdriver and threw in a few Running Powerbombs. Competitive match, but Damdai took full advantage of Graham's unwillingness to switch away from Boxer.

2nd Round Winners Bracket:
• Hung "Afro Legends" Nguyen (Boxer) defeats John Choi (Ryu) 2-0. Balanced set back and forth, each players took a round. Choi was doing a good job keeping Balrog out, but once Afro got in, he did several terrific cheese throws with Balrog to win the set.

2nd Round Losers Bracket:
• Graham Wolfe (Boxer) defeats David Sirlin (Cammy, Dictator) 2-1. After a close first round, which Graham won, Sirlin had a dominate 2 rounds to win the set with Cammy. Graham made great adjustments and predictions in the 2nd set to beat Cammy though. Sirlin switched to M. Bison, and Graham did great mix ups between sweeps and his throw and made Sirlin guess at which way to block. Sirlin guessed wrong a few times and took a lot of damage which Graham capitalized on to win.

• Damien "Damdai" Dailidenas (Ken) defeats Louis "Thelo" Paquin (E. Honda) 2-0. Damdai played a lot of keep away fireball traps with Ken, as expected, but Thelo took full advantage when he could get inside, but it wasn't enough as Damdei correctly anticipated a lot of Honda's moves and was able to counter.

1st Round Losers Bracket:
• Graham Wolfe (Boxer) beat Sin (Dhalsim) 2-0. Graham had some BIG Turnaround Punches against Sin's Dhalsim to score big damage and get inside. Sin couldn't keep Balrog away from him and Graham won in convincing fashion.

• Damien "Damdai" Dailidenas (Ken) defeats Alex Valle (Ryu) 2-1. Damdai played a very unconventional Ken and had a strong showing against Valle. Ken threw a lot of fireballs early, which is an unusual strategy against Ryu, but he took the first set regardless. Damdei also did a lot of jump ins to catch Alex when he was tossing fireballs. Alex was able to counter some of them with anti air Shoryukens, but in the end Damdai kept up a consistent offensive and outplayed Valle.

1st Round Winners Bracket:
• Hung "Afro Legends" Nguyen (Dee Jay) beat Louis "Thelo" Paquin (E. Honda) 2-0. Thelo played a good set against Afro Legend's Dee Jay, but still lost. This is a match that most people feel is heavily in favor of Dee Jay, but Thelo had great spacing and kept it close through the match even though he lost.

• John Choi (Ryu) defeats David Sirlin (Fei Long) 2-1. Back and forth, both players had strong rounds early. Choi had some clutch play, but also did a good job of adapting to Sirlin's tactics, countering Fei's Chicken Wings with Shoryukens. Choi had smart reads and a lot of patience. Ended up being a very nice match here.

Match Notes

Grand Finals Set 1:
• Issei Suzuki (Yun) beats Rommel (Yang). After a close first round where Issei barely pulled it out, he dominated the 2nd round to take the match. Justin Wong (Chun Li) defeats Jimmy "Emphynaps" Tran (Urien). Justin and Issei controlled things throughout this competition — they didn't lose a single match and stayed in the Winners Bracket the whole way through.

Final Round Losers Bracket:
• Rommel (Yang) defeats Ryan "Fubarduck" Harvey (Chun Li). Jimmy "Emphynaps" Tran (Urien) beat Mark "Mopreme" Royogski (Ryu) in a great match. Mark had an excellent parry and throw out of Urien's Aegis Reflector set up, but Jimmy still pulled it out.

3rd Round Losers Bracket:
• Mark "Mopreme" Royogski (Ryu) beat J.R. Rodriguez (Akuma). Ryan "Fubarduck" Harvey (Chun Li) beats Alex Valle.

2nd Round Losers Bracket:
• Alex Valle beat Thomas "The Pad Player" (Ibuki), J.R. Rodriguez beat Amir (Chun Li).

• Mark "Mopreme" Royogski (Ryu) beat Lee Cephas (Dudley), Ryan "Fubarduck" Harvey (Chun Li) beat Starboy (Ken).

2nd Round Winners Bracket:
• Justin Wong (Chun Li) beat Rommel (Yang), Issei (Yun) beat Jimmy "Emphynaps" Tran (Urien).

1st Round Losers Bracket:
• Alex Valle (Ken) lost to Chang, but J.R. Rodriguez's Akuma was able to beat Chang's Yun and Ricky's Chun Li.

• Mike Zaimont (Makoto) and Sanchez (Alex) were beaten by Ryan "Fubarduck" Harvey (Chun Li) and Mark "Mopreme" Royogski (Ryu).