MANILA, Philippines — Sibol's only all-women team in the 32nd Southeast Asian Games, the Women's Mobile Legends team, captured the team's first silver medal in this year's Games as they fell to powerhouse Indonesia, 2-3, in the gold medal match.
Composed of Kaye Maerylle “Keishi” Alpuerto, Rica Fatima “Amoree” Amores, Sheen “SHINOA” Perez, Mery Christine “Meraaay” Vivero, Gwen “not ayanami” Diagon, Alexandra Dardo and coached by Abraham “Bam” Unida, Sibol made it hard for their rivals, denying a 3-0 sweep and turning the finals into a five-game series.
Similar to the group stages, team Indonesia dominated Sibol in Game 1 but the team was able to retaliate and win Games 2 and 3, marking the first game loss of the Indonesian squad in an international tournament.
With Sibol at match point, Indonesia turned the momentum around, putting pressure on the jungle and banning heroes the Philippine meta is known for like the Estes.
In the deciding Game 5, Indonesia managed to wipe out all heroes on the side of Sibol around the 15th minute to make history as the first women gold medalist in Mobile Legends. Sibol likewise earned the team's first silver medal in this year's Games.
In the other esports venue, both SIBOL's PUBG Mobile teams saw a slow start, initially finishing at the bottom of the pack at 11th and 16th of the overall standing by the fourth round in the qualifiers.
By the fifth map however, SIbol’s first team stacked up 20 elimination points, finishing the fifth round as the last team standing and propelling themselves from 11th to third place with one last round left in the qualifiers. Meanwhile, Sibol's second team seemed to be on the brink of elimination at 18th place.
With one last map to go, Sibol’s second squad managed to break into the last four team standings in the last round, scoring much needed points. Even though they only scored one kill in the map, the ranking point for finishing fourth propelled them to 16th place, enough to qualify to the final round.
But all eyes are on their brothers in Sibol's first team as they secured another map win with 19 eliminations, taking the number one seed in the overall standings with 79 total points, 14 points ahead of second seed Vietnam's second team.
The PUBG Mobile Final round will see three days of competition starting today until May 14, while the Men's Mobile Legends squad will begin their gold medal defense in the group stages today.