This year of UK CS at LAN concludes with Washington besting 8Sins in the UKIC Season 8 Masters Finals in Sheffield, regaining their spot at the top of the scene.
This marks the fifth UKIC trophy for Tom ‘arTisT‘ Clarke, Mason ‘Vacancy‘ Haines, and Matas ‘Extinct‘ Strumila, who have won them together across six seasons. This is the third UKIC win for James ‘bevve‘ Slinn, and the first for Nathan ‘Unicorn‘ Dowd, who completed the Irish core, and in turn, making this the first time an Irish team has won a major UK & Ireland LAN.
Vacancy, Unicorn, Extinct, arTisT and bevve winning UKIC Season 8 Masters – Credit: UKIC
8Sins unable to win back-to-back UKIC Finals
In Season 7, 8Sins – then dripmen – took advantage of a troubled Washington squad – then Max – to become the first team to dethrone them on LAN since 2023. However, this success was not sustained as they couldn’t retain the title.
In theory, 8Sins has upgraded their roster since Season 7, but this didn’t show on the server as they regressed in their achievements, losing 1-3 against Washington.
As mentioned previously, after dripmen signed to 8Sins, they announced the switch out of Josh “JAUSTERE” Philpott with William “dobbo” Dobson coming in. On paper, this is a superb pickup for 8Sins as dobbo has an immense amount of tier 2 experience playing with GamerLegion in 2020 and then various iterations of Into The Breach from 2021 to 2023. During his time at ITB, he won an international LAN in 2022 at Assembly Summer in Finland.
Moreover, in UK mixes, dobbo would go onto two EPIC.LANs and one UKIC Finals, all of them with bevve and the two EPIC wins with Extinct. However, despite his acclaimed past, this didn’t seem to show on the server in Sheffield as he only posted a 0.95 HLTV rating. In comparison, the replaced JAUSTERE topped the scoreboard in the Season 7 finals with a 1.30 HLTV rating.
Prime loses another grand finals to Washington
The only success 8Sins found in the BO5 grand finals was on map two, Overpass. This saw them complete a 5-10 comeback when they changed onto the CT side, to close out the map 13-11. Unfortunately, outside of this one half, they were never able to get going.
The main reason for this, as stated in the post-match interview by arTisT, is that Washington did a lot of preparation and never allowed 8Sins to feel comfortable around the map. 8Sins didn’t play badly, but in the grand finals, Washington just simply looked better and had a clear game plan, a stark contrast to Season 7.
One positive outcome from playing the UKIC Season 8 Masters Finals is that 8Sins played out the five needed games to qualify for a VRS rank. It isn’t the most jaw-dropping rank as they are 187th in the world and 116th in Europe, but it is a start.
Washington back on top in UK CS
As described in an interview with UKIC on media day, arTisT explained that it was a “very uncomfortable season” for Washington. This is largely in part due to their roster changes, poor ESEA season and general instability. Swapping players in and out constantly over the last few months led this team to ultimately come to the UKIC Season 8 Finals with one thing on their mind: “to have fun and enjoy it”.
With that expectation, the main reason they brought in Unicorn was to have an Irish core on HLTV. With that in mind, it is fair to be surprised to see how they dominated 8Sins, always holding the momentum.
arTisT went on to explain how coming into the finals not as reigning champions took off pressure and allowed them to play with no stress. This was embodied on the server as pressure was flipped onto their opposition for the first time.
Never before has an Irish core won a major UK & Ireland LAN
Alongside this, the main core of Washington all stepped up to the plate with Extinct and Vacancy posting a 1.40 + HLTV rating, and arTisT sitting at a commendable 1.20 HLTV rating. Individually, 8Sins were unable to contend against this highly experienced core. Apart from losing map two, they dominantly won each map 13-8, 13-6 and 13-8.
Not only did Washington achieve the goal of playing on HLTV with an Irish core, but their win symbolises the first ever Irish core to win a major UK & Ireland LAN.
The future is unclear for Washington – not an uncommon position for them to be in. After the UKIC Season 8 Masters Finals, they sit 104th in the European VRS ranking, so they have the opportunity to rebuild around the core. But for now, we sit and wait to see what the next steps are for the best UK CS team.
