Inaugural Frag VALORANT competitions bring LANs to Philly, Fullerton

Cheering, screaming and trash talk could be heard across the stages of Nerd Street’s Fullerton and Philadelphia Localhost locations this weekend as teams competed in the first Fragadelphia VALORANT tournament.

Two winners were crowned during the tournaments, which happened simultaneously across the country from each other. Here’s a breakdown of all of the action that happened in each location this weekend and which teams were crowned winners.

Philadelphia

Photo credit: Nerd Street

The Block, which is the location where the Philadelphia tournament was held, was buzzing on Saturday. Most of the play area was blocked off for teams competing in the event, and many teams were gathered for the first time in-person to compete with their teams.

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Booster Seat Gaming, Team Name, Soniqs and On The Way won their opening matches in the playoff bracket, and Booster Seat Gaming and On The Way made it to the grand final. The two teams battled it out in the best-of-three, and the match was a nail-biter.

Photo credit: Nerd Street

The first map went to On The Way in overtime and ended with a score of 15-13. The second map was also just as close, but didn’t quite get into overtime. The match ended when On The Way won the second map 13-11, and they were crowned the winners of the East Coast Fragadelphia. On The Way’s roster featured TSM’s Sean "bang" Bezerra.

Some notable players that also made an appearance at the venue were the members of XSET Female and Cloud9 White. FaZe Clan’s Corey “Corey” Nigra also competed alongside T1’s Braxton "brax" Pierce for a team called iwnl.

Photo credit: Nerd Street

Fullerton

The pool of players that made it into the playoff bracket was much larger at the Fullerton location, which featured 29 teams compared to 16 in Philadelphia.

Vietnamese Curry made it through their side of the bracket with relative ease, only dropping a map to Froggers on their way to the grand final, and ex-Serenity Black had a clean run to the grand final. They didn’t drop a single map in the playoff bracket.

The grand final match wasn’t quite as close as the one in Philadelphia, and ex-Serenity Black made quick work of Vietnamese Curry on Haven with a score of 13-8. The next map on Ascent started with Vietnamese Curry ahead 7-5 at the end of the half, but they lost their momentum in the second half, and fell 10-13, giving ex-Serenity Black the win in Fullerton.

There also were some notable players at the Fullerton location that made it out, including the members of Shopify Rebellion, The Guard’s Ha “Sayaplayer” Jeong-woo (who recently switched to VALORANT from the Overwatch League) and four members of Rise competed alongside T1’s Rahul "curry" Nemani for Vietnamese Curry.

Both winning teams took home $4,125 in prize money for their team, and bragging rights. Nerd Street’s next VALORANT LAN takes place Jan. 8-9 at The Block in Philadelphia. That competition will award a prize pool of $10,000 and points toward the Winter Champs finals which take place in February.

Lead photo credit: Nerd Street