Standings
As always with the last article of a series, I will be going through the team in standings order
Topping the standings is the U-Next Pirates. They had many difficulties during the semifinals, from being the last team to get a 1st place to Nakabayashi getting a fever near the end. However, they were able to pull through. They fended off the persistent EX Furinkazan, went 16 games in a row without a 4th and ended the last day with a daily double. Sitting in the top position, they will be the favourites to win it all and win the championship like they did in the 2019-20 season.
Coming in 2nd place is the EX Furinkazan. What a semifinals it has been for the team. They started off in the negatives in 5th place. Then they kept winning and winning and winning. On April 29th, they moved into 1st place in the overall standings. Though they weren’t able to hold onto that top spot in the end, this is much further than anyone every thought they would get, especially considering that they were in 9th place going into March. They will have 16 games to move into 1st and lift the same plate that they raised in the 2020-21 season.
Taking 3rd place is the Kadokawa Sakura Knights. Though they had the fewest number of 1sts out of all the teams, their ability to avoid 4th place allowed them to stay in a playoff spot. In three of their last four games, they made strong plays near the end of the game to move up a placement and stopped them from losing too much. Now that they have done the hard work of getting to the finals, it is time to get aggressive and win the plate.
Taking the last playoff spot is the Akasaka Drivens. It was a rough time for Taro during the semifinals, but the rest of the team came through to reduce those losses. In particular, Futoshi had an 80.00% rentai rate to be the 3rd-best performer of the semifinals. Though the team is lower than they were at the start of the semifinals, they have completed the goal of making it to the finals. In the first three season, the team entering the finals in 4th place ended up winning it all. The team’s aim now is to revive that trend.
Sitting in 5th place is the Shibuya Abemas. Unfortunately, the Shibuya Abemas will be unable to defend their championship title and it will be the first finals without them. They started off the semifinals well with a daily double, but they weren’t able to keep the momentum going. In the middle of the semifinals, they got three 4ths in a row. When Hinata was finally able to get another 1st of the semifinals on the final day, it was an emotional interview since she knew it was too little too late. They will have the offseason to review what went wrong and adjust for next season.
Finally, we have the Konami Mahjong Fight Club. It just wasn’t their semifinals. They were making doing okay in the first half, staying fairly stable even though they went down to 5th place. Then things started to fall apart in the second half. On April 22, the normally untouchable TakiHisa combo got back-to-back 4ths and dropped the team in the negatives. Every game day after, they had a 4th place. They dropped further and further and ended up in 4th place. The next few months will be spent training to prepare for next season.
This Fifth’s M-League Stats
3-0-0-1
▲+163.5
2-1-1-0
▲+105.9
0-2-2-0
▼-19.0
0-2-1-1
▼-75.9
1-0-1-2
▼-71.8
0-1-1-2
▼-102.7
And that’s the end of the M-League 2023-24 Semifinals! The semifinals have been exciting and our four finalists have been decided! Which team will be the first to win two championships? Will it be the 2019-20 champions, the U-Next Pirates? Will it be the 2020-21 champions, the EX Furinkazan? Will it be the 2021-22 champsions, the Kadokawa Sakura Knights? Or will it be the original winners, the Akasaka Drivens who won in the inaugural 2018-19 season? As always, we’ll just have to wait and see! The action starts on May 6 at 19:00 JST! See you then!
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