There was a Dallas Fuel match slated for last Sunday that never happened.

The Fuel were supposed to be in China playing the Hangzhou Spark, accounting for what would’ve been the team’s fourth match of the season.

What were the Fuel doing instead?

“Scrimming,” Fuel coach Aaron “Aero” Atkins said. He tagged on a hearty laugh.

There’s not much else the Fuel could do. The outbreak of the coronavirus that’s had a ripple effect across the globe made an unwelcome impact on the Overwatch League, which was hoping to test its geolocation goal this season. All overseas matches during February and March were canceled to avoid any health risks with its players.

The Fuel, who opened the season Feb. 8-9 in Arlington with two losses, were one of the Western teams that were hit the hardest. But because of the nature of the schedule, some teams haven’t had any postponements. Houston, for example, has already completed six matches. The defending-champion San Francisco Shock have played just once.

Five teams, four based in China and one in South Korea, haven’t yet appeared on stage and are adjusting their home bases. A handful of teams like the Fuel and Shock, whose lone match was a Feb. 9 win over Dallas, are now dealing with what amounts to a second offseason.

Dallas had five consecutive matches canceled, with the next on-stage appearance scheduled for March 28 against Vancouver in San Francisco -- a 48-day hiatus between regular-season games.

The Fuel get oodles of practice time now, but finding value is troublesome. Four different heroes are banned every week, and with the Fuel not playing for three more weeks, they can’t really practice the way other teams can.

“We have been practicing a lot where teams will agree on certain hero bans and then we practice with that knowledge,” Aero said. “I think right now the second part of that is because all of our matches in China and Korea canceled, that’s more of what makes practice weird for us right now.”

Matches could potentially be rescheduled, meaning the Fuel have even more uncertainty considering hero bans aren’t the only factor limiting the team.

At least three teams based in Asia said they were flying to Los Angeles in late February to escape the dangers in their home countries and start their seasons, according to The Washington Post.

The league prefers to comment once there is a revised schedule, a league spokesperson recently told The Dallas Morning News.

“Blizzard hasn’t officially decided when we are going to be playing and who we are going to be playing in makeup matches. and the map pool changes in Week 7,” Aero said. “If it gets scheduled for after Week 7, it will be on a new map pool.”

Blind sided

Dallas Fuel Head Coach Aaron "Aero" Atkins practices on Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at Envy Gaming headquarters in Dallas. (Ashley Landis/The Dallas Morning News) (Ashley Landis / Staff Photographer)

The league tried rescheduling the China matches -- consisting of 17 matches before this upcoming weekend -- to the South Korea homestand planned for Saturday and Sunday in Seoul, but the spreading of this new coronavirus, known as COVID-19, forced OWL’s hands again.

China was predictable, Fuel tank player Ash “Trill” Powell said. The rest wasn’t.

“We had a decent heads up about China, but the Korea cancellation was kind of sudden,” Trill said. “We expected to go and some teams were already planning and expecting to play, then all of the sudden a lot of cases popped up. I think it's the right choice to not go because it’s kind of scary over there.”

The Fuel weren’t upset by the league’s decision, but the situation was frustrating. They can only practice a game that will absolutely change several times before they play again. What the Fuel can do, Aero said, is mold their game the way they want to play.

“We are focused on practicing certain styles, so even if heroes change, you can still do a certain type of style whether it be a poke, dive or rush composition,” Aero said. “We say for certain time blocks we will play a specific style, then change heroes and try to play that same style. Right now our goal is to practice everything we can control.”

The chemistry the Fuel build is important. They want to bounce back after dropping two matches to start the season. To do that, a newly constructed team has to learn to work together.

That can be groomed in practice, but it’s made on the stage.

While the Fuel were subject to a schedule overhaul, a team like the Philadelphia Fusion avoided the mess. The title contender saw few differences in its schedule.

“Almost none,” Fusion assistant coach Christopher “ChrisTFer” Graham said in a phone interview Wednesday. “I would argue the only thing that happened was we weren’t able to practice against the teams like Dallas on the west side. Obviously those teams would never be our scrim partners anyway. There was no reason for them to scrim on the patch we were playing on.”

The Fusion (5-0) plowed through their competition thus far and remain at the top of the league standings. They play again on Sunday, too, against the Paris Eternal in Washington D.C. That’s far more stage time than Dallas.

Considering the Fuel have seven weeks to prepare between matches, Aero said the expectations for his team might have elevated.

“I think there might be a little bit of pressure but the main benefit of playing matches is that there is a certain synergy and experience that players get together and we may be able to get that, but not right this second,” Aero said. “I try not to think about outside pressure too much and keep our players focused.”

Untouched

Dallas Fuel's William “Crimzo” Hernandez practices on Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at Envy Gaming headquarters in Dallas. (Ashley Landis/The Dallas Morning News) (Ashley Landis / Staff Photographer)

Fusion star tank player Gael “Poko” Gouzerch couldn’t think of any cons to the Fusion’s current schedule. He brought up the Shock, who like the Fuel, don’t play again until Week 8. The Fusion have a slow, methodical schedule that is rare for teams in OWL’s third season, with just one match a week.

“The Shock have like a two-week break, so they probably won’t practice the hero bans this week,” Poko said in the phone interview. “They will probably plan for next week. They get to go in with all the resources for the next week. They are still practicing, but don’t know what’s ahead.”

McCree, Widowmaker, Reinhardt and Moira were banned for this current week. The only thing the Fuel can really do with that information is know that those heroes will be available next week, which they don’t participate in either.

But Aero still has plans.

“In the coaching staff we are drafting up scenarios of how we want to do things based on what the bans look like. We take that into our scrims as much as we can,” Aero said. “I’m really confident with where we are right now because the way we built our roster was designed around us finding our own style. We want to be able to push our own style, not just following whatever the meta is. We want to have our own theme and our own flavor.”

The Fuel treated a two-hour slot every week like a match and will continue that. They don’t play for trial and error during the period. That time is about winning.

Eleven players from eight different countries make up the roster. Three of the players don’t speak English fluently, so communication on stage is a crucial element the Fuel couldn’t easily replicate.

William “Crimzo” Hernandez played in two World Cups for Canada and was in the Contenders League for two seasons. He joined the Fuel prior to the start of the season. He’s used the situation to find the positives.

“With this extra amount of time we have off, we can really grind things out together, especially with our roster being international,” Crimzo said. “It takes time when you have players that are new to a team. This break is good for us.”

The future remains uncertain for the Fuel, and currently there are more questions than announced solutions.

But they aren’t going to stop playing Overwatch.