Overview of the Overwatch League 2021 Countdown Cup – the final event of the OWL regular season

Loading

The matches of the Overwatch League 2021 Countdown Cup, the last event of the OWL regular season, took place from July 30th to August 22nd. The competition resulted in five out of eight teams receiving invitations to the league’s final stage. In this new article, Esports Charts will talk about the tournament’s results and viewer activity amidst the discrimination-related scandal at Activision Blizzard.

Results of the Overwatch League 2021 regular season

The organizers of the Overwatch League 2021 Countdown Cup have divided the participants of the group stage of the competition into two divisions: Atlantic and Pacific. The former was represented by twelve teams, while the latter was represented by eight. The best teams of this stage advanced to the Regional Knockouts stage, and after that to the Tournament Weekend.

According to the results of the regular season, Shanghai Dragons, Dallas Fuel, Chengdu Hunters, Los Angeles Gladiators, and Atlanta Reign advanced to the Overwatch League 2021 playoffs. The rest of the participants in the championship’s main stage will be determined according to the results of the Play-In.

The playoffs of the 2021 Overwatch League 2021 will be played online on September 16-25th. Eight teams will compete for a prize pool of $3.2M, and the winner will be awarded $1.5M. In the case of the last two tournaments of the OWL series, it was San Francisco Shock that became the champion.

Viewership statistics of the Overwatch League 2021

In 97 hours of airtime, the Overwatch League 2021 Countdown Cup gained 4.1M Hours Watched. The most popular teams were San Francisco Shock, Los Angeles Gladiators, Toronto Defiant, Houston Outlaws, and Atlanta Reign – all of which gathered at least 48K Average Viewers on their broadcasts. In total, they accounted for 2.95M Hours Watched (71% of the total Hours Watched).

The Overwatch League 2021 Countdown Cup attracted 71K Peak Viewers and 42.5K Average Viewers. The former indicator was achieved during the match between San Francisco Shock and Dallas Fuel on the second day of the competition’s main stage.

The top 5 most watched-matches (based on the Average Viewers indicator) also included such encounters as Toronto Defiant versus Paris Eternal, Los Angeles Gladiators versus Chengdu Hunters, Toronto Defiant versus Atlanta Reign, and Los Angeles Gladiators versus Houston Outlaws. These matches were followed by 63.3-66.5K Peak Viewers.

Comparison with other Overwatch League 2021 events

Overwatch League 2021 Countdown Cup became known for the lowest viewer activity of all the OWL regular season tournaments. The event fell behind May Melee (6.3M Hours Watched, 69.1K Average Viewers), June Joust (4.7M Hours Watched, 52K Peak Viewers), and Summer Showdown (4.6M Hours Watched, 48.1K Average Viewers). It should be noted that the Countdown Cup has been on the air longer than all other competitions.

Simultaneously with conducting the championship, Activision Blizzard has to deal with the discrimination and harassment lawsuit filed by the California authorities. This caused Pringles, IBM, and State Farm to refuse to cooperate with the company — while Coca-Cola, one of the main sponsors of the Overwatch League, temporarily stopped its support of the competition.

The coronavirus pandemic is yet another obstacle to the organizational process behind the Overwatch League 2021. Activision Blizzard announced that the playoffs of the tournament in Hawaii will be held without spectators. Not every team will be able to perform in person at this event, either. The Asian teams will have to play while being located in their home region.

Subscribe to our social networks in order to access all the latest esports statistics. If you have any questions, please contact us via [email protected] with any request. We will reply as soon as possible.