Scottisch VALORANT success at 2024 VCT Masters Madrid
26 March 2024
The members of Sentinels have been flying high this month after winning the 2024 VCT (VALORANT Champions Tour) Masters Madrid. It was the first victory in a Masters for the North American organisation since they clinched the title at the 2022 VCT Masters Reykjavik, in Iceland. They beat South Korean organisation Gen.G 2-3 in the grand finale, which also became the most-watched VALORANT event in the franchise’s history. On top of that, the Sentinels victory has a significance for esports in the UK as well, because the side was coached to success by Scottish former Rainbow Six Siege analyst Drew “DrewSpark” Spark-Whitworth.
American success with a Scottish touch
The grand finale of 2024 VCT Masters Madrid went down between Sentinels and Gen.G, with the American organisation coming out on top after an impressive comeback. On the first map (Breeze), the latter got off to a raring start, booking a 13-8 victory. On the following map (Bind), it looked like the final was going to be over quickly as Gen.G continued their good start and took a 10-7 lead. A seeming revival of Sentinels sent the second map into overtime though, with the Americans actually winning it.
At that moment, it looked like Sentinels were picking up the pace at the cost of their South Korean opponents, but nothing could be further from the truth. On the third map (Ascent), Gen.G Esports clinched a seemingly devastated victory by beating Sentinels 13-8 once again. At this point, many viewers were expecting a dominant finishing move from Gen.G to keep the grand final to four maps and take home the title, but that was without taking Zachary “zekken” Patrone into account.
The American-Filipino member of Sentinels suddenly found his stride on the fourth map (Split), which ended up deciding the grand finale in the surprising favour of the Americans. With an ACS of 366 and an impressive 29 kills by himself, “zekken”almost single-handedly guided his team into the fifth and final map of the 2024 VCT Masters Madrid grand finale.
That map turned out to be Icebox, which ended up being the most one-sided of all maps played in the grand finale. For the first time in the match though, it was Sentinels who dominated the map and not Gen.G. Around the halfway mark, Sentinels took control of the battle and managed a 6-13 victory, making it a 2-3 to decide the grand finale.
Most-watched VALORANT event ever
With that victory, “DrewSparks” continued a run of victories that is starting to become more and more impressive by the day. The Scottish coach also won VCT 2024: Americas Kickoff earlier this month, after finishing on top during the AfreecaTV VALORANT LEAGUE at the of last year as well. None of those victories can compare with the 2024 VCT Masters Madrid victory in terms of prize money, though, as the event in the Spanish capital brought Sentinels $ 250.000 in prize money. So far, “DrewSparks” has not managed to win a bigger monetary prize than that in his career.