Despite the unfortunate failure of the U.S. Postal Service to get us the assorted booster packs we intended to use for the Uber Draft to my house on time, 14 players came out for an impromptu draft of the block du jour, Scars of Mirrodin. Some added excitement came from the group of people in the race for the top 7. Nearly everyone ranked between 4th and 12th was in attendance, trying to earn automatic qualification for the Spring Invitational. There was also supposed to be drama among the top two players who were to be fighting one last time for the semester points lead, but unfortunately Hunter was unable to attend the event due hasty homework beats, and thus Michael Carney has become the final semester points leader, so congrats to him.
To add some excitement and parity to the players trying to qualify, we decided to put all the players near the bubble at the same table. This made for an exciting event, as players only played against their own tables in the first two rounds. In the end, however, yours truly finally pulled out of his Magic slump and got to do his two favorite things - tap Islands and draw cards:
4/11/11 Top Finishers: SOM/MBS Draft
1. 4-0 UR Control by Dominic Casali
2. 3-1 GB Infect by Mike Mooty
3. 3-1 Rw Aggro by Jordan Arnold
4. 2-1-1 BGW Midrange by Bryant Benson
Among the bubble players, we saw the return of Jason D'Mellow, who came out of his Magic hibernation to earn three league points and secure his spot in the Invitational. Skye Kutner, the player sitting in eighth place at the start of the event, had an uncharacteristically large number of Plains in his deck, and despite Dispensing some Justice, he was unable to pass any of the players in front of him. The same went for John and Kevin, who had rocky drafts and were unable to put multiple wins together.
Thanks to an unusual number of matches ending in draws, me, Mooty, and Jordan were the only players at 2-0 after the second round. The third round saw me use a slow, grinding approach with Vedalken Anatomist and Steel Hellkite to escape Mooty's impressive poison onslaught, which included Skithiryx and Phyrexian Crusader. Jordan's "limited Kuldotha Red" deck stormed by Kevin's poison deck to join me at 3-0.
In the finals, I lost a very anticlimactic game one after a mulligan to five while Jordan opened on turn 1 Kuldotha Rebirth, turn 2 Contested War Zone. In game 2, Jordan was the player taking the mulligans, and I stymied an early Goblin onslaught and put nine power of flyers into play with a Sky-Eel School and two Serum Rakers. However, Jordan summoned a Hoard-Smelter Dragon and stopped my flying assault. But, eventually I was able to trade two flyers for the dragon and soon afterwards clean up with Steel Hellkite. Game three was the best game of the match, with Jordan applying pressure with Concussive Bolts and a Kuldotha Flamefiend. However, after Turning the Flamefiend to Slag, Steel Hellkite came down just in time to save the day yet again, and when Jordan couldn't forge a removal spell, my dragon soon took down the match.
So, the Top 7 is set, as are the byes for Sunday's Invitational Qualifier. Here are the final League Standings with some extra annotations to indicate byes and the like:
1***. 73 - Michael Carney (18)
2***. 67 - Hunter Garrett (13)
3***. 58 - Michael Smith (14)
4***. 48 - Jordan Arnold (10)
5***. 44 - Chris Pear (15)
6***. 43 - Noah Senzel (15)
7***. 42 - Jason D'Mellow (7)
8**. 39 - Skye Kutner (11)
9**. 38 - Bryant Benson (9)
10**. 37 - John Kreinbring (12)
11**. 36 - Liz DiGangi (10)
12**. 35 - Kevin Hoover (13)
13**. 35 - Dane Newton (7)
14*. 32 - Scott Record (7)
15*. 30 - Joe Hammond (11)
16*. 30 - Mike Mooty (5)
17*. 25 - Kevin Crowley (7)
18. 16 - Roy Mustang (9)
19. 14 - Hannah Sharp (6)
20. 12 - Helen Croce (2)
21. 11 - Max Kruger (5)
22. 11 - Will Sturges (4)
23. 10 - Anna Hallahan (4)
24. 9 - Michael Cambata (4)
25. 9 - Haren Lalchand (3)
26. 8 - Alex Kerns (3)
27. 7 - Steven Nelson (5)
28. 7 - Alycia Johnson (1)
29. 6 - Tyler Deforge (5)
29. 6 - Joe Kozlowski (5)
31. 6 - Ethan Pepmiller (3)
32. 6 - Alex Siphom Chi (2)
33. 5 - Richie Harper (4)
34. 5 - Nick Catalfano (3)
34. 5 - Emile Paul (3)
36. 4 - Jason Navarro (1)
37. 3 - David Jacobsen (2)
38. 3 - Andrew Capik (1)
39. 2 - Kareem Elashmawy (1)
39. 2 - Luke Glesener (1)
39. 2 - Will Siu (1)
42. 1 - Zach Barton (1)
42. 1 - Gus Bora (1)
42. 1 - Kyle Coleman (1)
42. 1 - Joao Alberto de Faria (1)
42. 1 - Dan Gorelik (1)
42. 1 - Dan Hooghkirk (1)
42. 1 - Megan Moreno (1)
42. 1 - Glen Parker (1)
42. 1 - Christina Termini (1)
42. 1 - Greg Voskuhl (1)
* = Player has earned 1 bye in Qualifier
** = Player has earned 2 byes in Qualifier
*** = Player has automatically qualified for Invitational
As I mentioned last week, the Qualifier will be Extended format, this Sunday beginning at 2:30 (registration begins at 2; try to be there by 2:15 if you have no byes, 3:15 if you have 1 bye, or 4:00 if you have two byes). There will be some alternate activity for the Top 7 players to do (probably just some EDH matches), and that will also be announced later in the week, but it will not be a draft as previously announced, as I had to use extra packs for this draft instead. I'll figure something out and include it in the next email.
The long-lost, infamous 2-day shipping box arrived today (a week after shipping), and the Uber Draft will be on the last study day, which is Friday, April 29 at 1 P.M. Thank you all for your patience and understanding regarding this scheduling change.
Thanks for reading and I'll hopefully see many of you on Sunday!
- Dom
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