Bye Day (5 Jun 2013)
The spate of sweeps continues unabated, but day five of ACVIII still contained a few upsets. In the Alabriss bracket, KL finally logged a YYB win after losing two days in a row to DC, yet they dropped all three sidegames to KD, including their best game, SS. The Vaeolus bracket saw RI fall from the ranks of the undefeated, thanks to a stunning MSN loss to the Ninjas. FL earned their first double win of the year, beating VP in a close SS match and a low-scoring SOSD game. Finally, in the Minitheus bracket HW pulled a shocking upset over TM, not only winning YYB but going on to sweep all three sidegames as well. HW started out slowly, allowing TM to go up 3-0 in short order. The Haunties managed to tighten up their defenses, however, and as time went on the momentum slowly shifted from TM to HW, with HW scoring the go-ahead point in the last 20 seconds. Both teams moved on to SS, where the score was tied right up until the very end when HW won in a stunningly close 5-4 fashion thanks to their sending the proper flavor slushie down to a thirsty customer. MSN was never in doubt, as HW held the lead throughout the game, with only a last-minute surge by TM bringing their final tally within a single point of HW's. TM did their best to grab a consolation win in SOSD, matching the Haunties score-for-score in their first four kicks. However, a final missed goal by Evrem Guilako gave HW an opening, which they took full advantage of by sending their final kick into the net and earning the complete sweep.
The rest of the day's matches were mundane affairs, with DC, MD, TY and AD all sweeping their opponants. After the final team left the field, an official from the ACPC walked out and declared what is a new feature of ACVIII, the bye day. The announcement was met with confusion from the gathered crowd, as several of the ACPC's own rules were in contradiction by holding a bye day on the sixth day of a round without all teams having faced each other once, and the official quickly made tracks for the tunnels under the Colosseum, knowing enough from his experience in ACVII to get away before the crowd turned ugly. Inquiries to the ACPC were not returned, and a posting put up outside the Colosseum several hours later simply mentioned all of the activities that would be available to the public during the bye day, and did not address the latest controversy.
With all the teams resting up until the start of round two, speculation as to what the reassembled brackets will be has already started to run rampant. Hard-core fans of the game talk of possible matchups with TY, AD or DC, with KI, RI and MD thrown in the mix as well.