The NBA 2K League season is split up into 3 four weeks blocks. We started the season off with the Tip-Off Tournament followed by four weeks of regular season play. This weekend we have the 1st of 2 mid-season tournaments called The Turn. The schedule is a little imbalanced, so after four weeks some teams have played only 4 games such as Blazer5 Gaming, who sit in 1st place at 4-0, while other teams have played up to 6 games such as Raptors Uprising GC, who sit in 16th place at 1-5. Entering The Turn, Blazer5 Gaming and 76ers GC are the top 2 seeds and this is fitting as they were the 2 finalists in the Tip Off Tournament from a month ago. 76ers GC are looking to repeat as tournament champions and add the 2nd piece to the potential Tréfecta. The winner of each tournament receives a steel championship banner. If a team wins all three, they will achieve the Tréfecta, with all three banners forming "The Banner Chain". On top of bragging rights, there is a prize poll of $150,000 for this tournament with the champions taking home over $75,000. This would be a nice bonus on top of the player's salaries.
The Tip-Off Tournament followed a similar format to the NCAA Tournament with a Play-In game between the 16th and 17th seed to setup a 16 team bracket. Raptors Uprising GC and Pacers Gaming faced off in the Play-In game, where the Raptors dominated throughout winning 71-57 to advance to the main bracket. The next 3 games saw the Top 3 seeds take care of business without a problem. The next 3 games were a different story with the 13th seed Warriors, 12th seed Knicks, and 11th seed Celtics advancing over higher seeded opponents. To round out the Round of 16 matches, you had 7th seed Wizard and 9th seed Magic advancing to the quarterfinals. This completed Friday's set of games, so teams had a chance to review some tape and scout out their opponents. The 1st seed Blazer5 came out hot dropping 86 points beating the Magic and the 2nd seed 76ers squeaked by the Wizards winning a close game 70-67. After some upsets on Friday, you had a 12th seed and 13th seed go up against each other with the 12th seeded Knicks advancing. In the last quarterfinals game, the 11th seeded Celtics surprised some by crushing the 3rd seeded Mavs 77-59. The Blazer5 and 76ers were looking poised for a rematch in the finals once again, but the Celtics had other plans by beating the 76ers and setting up a 1st seed vs 11th seed finals. The Blazer5 were coming in hot dropping 72, 86, and 95 points in the first 3 rounds and they did not let up beating the Celtics 92-78. With a 4-0 record, the 1st seed, and now winners of The Turn Tournament, Blazer5 Gaming are the team to beat and will have a big target on their backs.
