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In the COD League Dallas Homestand, it was an exciting Sunday of competition with the Minnesota Rokkr and Florida Mutineers meeting in the Finals. Each team had to overcome tough opponents in the Chicago Huntsmen for Florida and the hometown Dallas Empire for Minnesota. Of course, all of this was done in an online-only environment due to the impact of COVID-19 aka coronavirus.

Minnesota entered the day with a lead over Florida in the points table and they established themselves as the team to beat early on. The series started off competitive with Minnesota clutching out the first Hardpoint on Piccadilly. Florida initially jumped out to a lead, but the Rokkr climbed back into the match, re-took the point, and held on to it late when Florida made a desperate push at the end. It appeared as if we were in for a tight contest between the two teams.

From that point, though, it was anything but a close competition. The Florida Mutineers entered the Dallas Homestand as underdogs, but when they play the way they did from this point forward it’s hard to not consider them a dangerous darkhorse in future tournaments. They started off with an absolutely dominant 6-2 victory in Search and Destroy. It wasn’t even one of those matches where the final score appeared more lopsided than the how the games actually played out. Florida was frequently in the lead, applying pressure, and hardly ever had to clutch out victories.

At that point, Florida had found its groove and Minnesota was showing some visible frustration. The broadcast gave a glimpse into the comms of Minnesota during this matchup and it was clear that it was feeling the pressure Florida was putting on it. The Mutineers cruised to victory and entered map four with a commanding looking 2-1 lead and a chance to win the entire tournament on Map 4.

This would have been an incredible opportunity for Minnesota to retake the momentum and force the series into a winner take all Map 5, but Florida made sure that didn’t happen. The Mutineers immediately won the initial skirmishes to take a commanding lead and midway through the game they had accumulated a 100 point lead, as it became very apparent that Florida was going to cruise on its way to its first homestand tournament victory of the season.

Florida had an early slip up on Map 1, but from that point on it was all Mutineers. They dominated the final and we’ll see if they can turn this momentum into a mid-season rise up the table.

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The NBA HORSE Challenge got off to a slow start as Trae Young and Chauncey Billups lacked some of the creativity we hoped to see in the competition, but after Billups’ comeback win business picked up and the final three matchups were highly entertaining.

Mike Conley Jr. took down Tamika Catchings as we learned he is ambidextrous and has a very nice indoor gym, which has to make him the favorite going forward. Zach LaVine skunked Paul Pierce in the most entertaining battle of the day, and finally it was Allie Quigley’s turn to pull an upset over Chris Paul in the final matchup of the night.

Quigley got up H-O to H early thanks to a seated bank shot — a classic of HORSE games — and Paul was unable to match.

Paul did pull off maybe the most creative shot we’ve seen thus far with a twisting, one-legged, holding the other leg, one-handed shot from the free throw line to reel back into the game.

However, Quigley was just rock steady throughout, hitting just about everything whether it was her shot or Paul’s shot, and CP3’s inability to cash in on when it was his turn proved to be his downfall. Quigley advanced on a banked in free throw that Paul saw rattle out to move on to the semifinals.

The semifinals are now set, with Quigley taking on Zach LaVine and Mike Conley taking on Chauncey Billups on Thursday night at 9 p.m. ET on ESPN.

In the COD League Dallas Homestand, it was an exciting Sunday of competition with the Minnesota Rekkr and Florida Mutineers meeting in the Finals. Each team had to overcome tough opponents in the Chicago Huntsmen for Florida and the hometown Dallas Empire for Minnesota. Of course, all of this was done in an online-only environment due to the impact of COVID-19 aka coronavirus.

Minnesota entered the day with a lead over Florida in the points table and they established themselves as the team to beat early on. The series started off competitive with Minnesota clutching out the first Hardpoint on Piccadilly. Florida initially jumped out to a lead, but the Rekkr climbed back into the match, re-took the point, and held on to it late when Florida made a desperate push at the end. It appeared as if we were in for a tight contest between the two teams.

From that point, though, it was anything but a close competition. The Florida Mutineers entered the Dallas Homestand as underdogs, but when they play the way they did from this point forward it’s hard to not consider them a dangerous darkhorse in future tournaments. They started off with an absolutely dominant 6-2 victory in Search and Destroy. It wasn’t even one of those matches where the final score appeared more lopsided than the how the games actually played out. Florida was frequently in the lead, applying pressure, and hardly ever had to clutch out victories.

At that point, Florida had found its groove and Minnesota was showing some visible frustration. The broadcast gave a glimpse into the comms of Minnesota during this matchup and it was clear that it was feeling the pressure Florida was putting on it. The Mutineers cruised to victory and entered map four with a commanding looking 2-1 lead and a chance to win the entire tournament on Map 4.

This would have been an incredible opportunity for Minnesota to retake the momentum and force the series into a winner take all Map 5, but Florida made sure that didn’t happen. The Mutineers immediately won the initial skirmishes to take a commanding lead and midway through the game they had accumulated a 100 point lead, as it became very apparent that Florida was going to cruise on its way to its first homestand tournament victory of the season.

Florida had an early slip up on Map 1, but from that point on it was all Mutineers. They dominated the final and we’ll see if they can turn this momentum into a mid-season rise up the table.

The NBA’s HORSE Challenge began on Sunday night with a surprising upset as Chauncey Billups took down Trae Young despite Young jumping out to an early 3-0 letter lead.

The second match proved to be the biggest situational mismatch, as Tamika Catchings faced off against Mike Conley Jr., who is the lone member of the competition with an indoor home gym. The climate controlled gym proved to be extremely useful for Conley, who only picked up one letter. However, while being indoors provides a prohibitive advantage, Conley also broke out some creative shots and despite being a lefty, he showed he’s more than capable with his off-hand, which makes him a HORSE god, as he can call “off-hand” shots from just about anywhere and make them.

Both Catchings and Conley were more creative than Billups or Young, with Catchings making her first basket on a 360 layup, but ultimately, Conley’s off-hand shots and lack of wind proved to be too much.

The game-winner, once again, took advantage of his ambidexterity as he made a preposterous layup from behind the backboard with his right hand.

I don’t care about indoor or outdoor, that’s a ridiculous shot. Given what we’ve seen thus far, Conley’s abilities with the off-hand, plus the indoor gym, plus just generally being more creative than most anyone we’ve seen has to make him the favorite going forward.

The NBA HORSE Challenge started with Chauncey Billups scoring an upset over betting favorite Trae Young and then saw Mike Conley Jr. dominate thanks to ambidexterity and an indoor gym against Tamika Catchings. The most fun competition of the first round, though, was the third matchup that pitted Paul Pierce against Zach LaVine, as the two had some funny banter as well as some of the most fun creativity we’ve seen.

The key to HORSE being good is when folks try things that aren’t normal shots, and that’s what both of them did pretty well with their creativity, even trying some goofy stuff off the top of their heads.

The “no dunk” rule they put in might as well have been the “Zach LaVine Rule” but he found a way to circumvent that rule by still doing wildly athletic shot attempts, like this tap the backboard reverse layup that Pierce couldn’t even get an attempt on.

Finally, LaVine went off the court and fired in the game-winner from the dirt outside his halfcourt, forcing Pierce to try something similar from the grass, which he was unable to do.

It was a highly entertaining 5-0 skunk from LaVine, but the worst part was we never got to see what Paul Pierce had planned for his little pink scooter he wheeled out to tease some weirdness that was coming if he ever got to choose the next shot.

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