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Watch NuckleDu, Punk, Daigo Umehara compete in Street Fighter V at DreamHack Austin this weekend

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Du “NuckleDu” Dang (Team Liquid)

Another Street Fighter V pro could potentially earn a seat at the Capcom Cup 2017 table at Capcom Pro Tour Premier Event DreamHack Austin this weekend.

Fierce international competition, including Ho Kun Xian, Tatsuya Haitani, and Daigo Umehara will be on-hand in an attempt to steal away the highly coveted 400 CPT points. That’s enough points to ensure a player qualifies for the CPT finale, since auto-qualifying spots were removed for CPT 2017. A win could vault a player further down on the Global Leaderboard right into the top 10. But it won’t be an easy task with North America’s most dominant players in attendance.

Victor “Punk” Woodley has a chance to set himself well ahead of the pack by following up his victory at NorCal Regionals with a second straight Premier Event win, and third straight overall CPT win in the month of April. We haven’t seen that kind of dominance since Lee “Infiltration” Seon-woo (who is still on a sabbatical from CPT competition) won Final Round, NCR and then Evo early last year. Or Du “NuckleDu” Dang’s similar run in late 2016, winning Canada Cup, Red Bull Battle Grounds, and of course, Capcom Cup 2016.

That raises the question on whether Punk can sustain his streak or if players will eventually figure him out like they did Infiltration by the time Capcom Cup rolls around. Punk is the hottest player in all of Street Fighter V right now. He also plays a number of characters at a high level, similar to Infiltration and NuckleDu. Combine that with his deadly neutral and whiff punish game and it’s no wonder he is the clear favorite to win again.


Xian is another player to keep an eye on at DreamHack. He put in a long, tiresome year with FANG in 2016 and now he wants to win with Ibuki. For the second time in his career, he won Final Round, the first Premier Event on the CPT. He’s proven in the past he’s more than willing to block other players from earning points to qualify for Capcom Cup so one should expect no less in Austin this weekend.

Haitani currently sits at number two on the Global Leaderboard and he would also be happy to absorb more CPT points with a win at DreamHack Austin. Haitani won CPT Premier Event Ultimate Fighting Arena in France earlier this month but finish a somewhat disappointing 17th place at NCR.

Of the other North American players to keep an eye on: NuckleDu is still looking for his first CPT victory in 2017, Justin Wong seeks to right whatever is wrong with his game in Season 2, and Ryan “Filipino Champ” Ramirez is looking to bounce back from a 33rd place finish at NCR after taking third at Ultimate Fighting Arena. It will also be interesting to see if Long “LPN” Nguyen can build on his first CPT Premier Event top 8 ever at NCR.

Other notable players in attendance include Daigo, fresh off advancing to ELeague’s Finals, Masato “Bonchan” Takahashi, who finished a surprising fourth at NCR, Bruce “GamerBee” Hsiang, Martin “Marn” Phan, and Darryl “Snake Eyez” Lewis.

Pools for Street Fighter V begin Saturday at 8AM PT and will run through top 8, which will take place Sunday at 1PM PT. You can catch all the action on the Capcom Fighters Twitch channel.


Michael Martin covers SFV and CPT. Follow him on Twitter @Bizarro_Mike.