M-League 2020 Finals: Games #7-8

Game #8

Riichi = Fold

May 14, Game 2

In S2-0, starts out with the best starting hand, being 2-shanten by turn 2. By turn 4, Takizawa is iishanten. With Takizawa calling riichi on a 25s ryanmen wait soon after, every had the simple plan of defending against the dealer riichi. Even Uchikawa, who had a chiitoi hand, ended up folding. The hand goes to ryuukyoku and Takizawa is the only one tenpai.

In S2-1, Takizawa starts out 2-shanten, getting to iishanten on turn 4. At the start of the 2nd row, Takizawa calls riichi again, this time with a 69s ryanmen wait. As with the first dealer riichi, everyone folds. Even Ooi, who was iishanten on turn 4 as well, breaks his hand against the dealer. The hand again ends in ryuukyoku with Takizawa the only one tenpai.

Because of these two hand and some bad luck, Takizawa was unable to get himself into a better position. Even though he was 2nd at that point, he had no cushioning to be comfortable.

Closeness

May 14, Game 2, S4-0

In S4-0, the scores are close. All of the hands in the game so far have been 5,200 or less. 9,300 points separate 4th place Sonoda and 1st place dealer Uchikawa, meaning that he is only a mangan away. With a very early pon, Takizawa calls pon on the west to aim for a 2,000 point hand to get to 2nd place. Trying to extend his lead and prevent the other players from catching up, Uchikawa calls pon on the red dragon to get to iishanten. At the end of the row, Takizawa draws a dora 7m to get to a 3,900 iishanten hand. With the distance between Uchikawa and Takizawa being 6,000 points away, a tsumo would be enough to tie for 1st. The very next turn, Takizawa draws a red 5p to get to mangan range, meaning he can win any hand to get 1st place. Immediately after, Ooi gets to tenpai and waits on a 3m/white dragon shanpon wait. In the 3rd row, Sonoda joins the tenpai crew by calling riichi on a 3p kanchan wait, with winning by tsumo putting him on top. When Sonoda discards the 6p, Takizawa calls chii to get to try to get to tenpai. However, he discards the 3p suji to try for tenpai and ends up dealing into Sonoda. Sonoda wins the hand with Riichi/Tanyao/Dora 1/Ura 1 for 8,000 points and to take 2nd place.

Final Scores

Standings

The scores were basically reverse from what we had last game. For all the teams, it was a disappointing day. Taking a look at the total scores from the day:

We can see that the gap between the Kadokawa Sakura Knights and the Shibuya Abemas is closing even tighter, being only 0.6pts away. Both of the teams wanted to take a big lead by the end of the day and niether of them were able to get there. For the EX Furinkazan, who were the “winners” of the day, they essentially wasted a day and lost time in gaining ground on the lead pack. For the Akasaka Drivens, they now have one less day to get out of 4th.

EX Furinkazan Elimination Tracker

It was a hard 4th and a difficult deal-in in S4-0, but it is what it is. The loss puts the gap between them and 4th down to 126.3, a sizeable gap but not large enough to relax too much. Even though the loss drops Takizawa down by over 200pts, he is still in a very comfortable position to not be 4th. If Aki and Katsumata both get 1sts and Takizawa gets two 4ths, the team should still be around the same number of points as they are right now, meaning that the Akasaka Drivens would have to get 126.3pts naturally for Takizawa to be eliminated. Otherwise, the team should be fine if they keep playing how they are and make sure that the Akasaka Drivens continue their no-firsts streak.

That’s all for today. The last full week of M-League is finished and we are officially 2/3 of the way into the finals! There are only 4 more games left in the finals and they are sure to be incredible. Who will be players worthy of lifting the M-League Championship Plate? We will have to wait until next week to find out! See you then!

Intro | Game #7 | Game #8