t is fairly simple to state a lofty goal: become the best, win a championship, create a legacy. However, it takes an inconceivable amount of time and effort to actually accomplish these things. For those of us who are NaVi fans, the time between the departure of Puppey and Kuroky and the present has seemed like an eternity. We watched as the once beloved and feared team became little more than an overdone joke while they desperately tried to remain relevant in the vicious whirlpool that is competitive Dota 2. Many times we thought NaVi might have made it free of the undertow, only to watch them get sucked back under, lifeless once more.
After TI7 we saw the tides begin to turn for NaVi. They started to qualify for events, first reaching StarLadder and then the PGL Open in quick succession. In only a matter of days, NaVi had managed to outperform almost an entire year’s worth of results. The newcomers Crystallize and RodjER were off to an explosive start, but we had seen this before from NaVi. With both Fng and Artstyle, the team had looked promising but quickly fallen apart. Many waited for what was thought of as an inevitable fall; but instead, we saw a young team who had great potential, a team who were staying competitive with opponents that were assumed to be out of their league.
While NaVi did fall to Team Secret in the group stage at StarLadder i-League Invitational #3, it came after already beating them in an earlier Bo3. A loss at PGL Bucharest in the group stage once again should have been devastating; but looking closer, they had given the eventual winners, Mineski, one of their only two losses during the event. While they were failing to make it out of groups, there was no sense of dread hanging around the team. There was something that was different about this NaVi when compared to past iterations. They gave us a reason to stay hopeful
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