Harsha stands among Titans

"Pretty good."

That was all Vancouver Titans Vancouver Titans OWL Rank #18 Roolf Randal Stark flex support KSAA Alhumaidi Alruwaili off tank Dalton Dalton Bennyhoff dps sHockWave Niclas Smidt Jensen dps ShRedLock Abtin Shirvani tank CarCar Carson First support assistant coach Harsha had to say about how he felt after his team took the Stage 1 title with a perfect record.

Of course, he was able to continue after that. Harsha is no stranger to talking about his thoughts and opinions. He once wrote about Overwatch on over.gg, was a member of multiple podcasts and uploaded content on YouTube.

That was before he joined the Overwatch League prior to its first season. Now? He's the only non-Korean coach on Stage 1's best team.

In fact, he's the only non-Korean period. The team is built from the RunAway RunAway Contenders KR Rank #2 F4zE Lim Si-hyun off tank Revenge An Hyeong-geun (안형근) flex support WOOHYAL Sung Seung-hyun (성승현) off tank Assassin Kim Sung-won (김성원) dps Mer1t Choi Tae-min dps Mag Kim Tae-sung (김태성) tank ChiYo Han Hyeon-syuk (한현석) support roster plus the addition of rapel . To an outside observer, this may look like an obstacle.

Harsha, however, has experience.

"Last year I lived with [Shock players] Architect and ChoiHyoBin -- and they've improved a lot -- but they didn't have particularly good English then," he said. "And then the Shock coaching staff in Stage 4 was all Korean. Admittedly they could speak English, so it wasn't the same."

"If you're surrounded by another language, you're going to pick up on things. So I picked up on a bunch of words and tonal stuff, so I can kinda understand what they're saying even if they're just talking Korean -- to their surprise," he added with a laugh. "But it hasn't been that bad, they all have basic English, so I can communicate things I need to to them."

And while Harsha may be able to currently communicate many ideas he wants to them right now, it will likely get easier with time. He says the roster plans on taking English lessons soon. While he understands them, a lot of his coaching has to go through the team's other staff because he doesn't speak the language well.

Key to Harsha's understanding of his new team is the time he spent on his old team: the San Francisco Shock San Francisco Shock OWL Rank #2 ChoiHyoBin Choi Hyo-Bin (최효빈) off tank Viol2t Park Min-ki flex support Striker Kwon Nam-joo (권남주) dps ANS Lee Seon-chang (이선창) dps smurf Yoo Myeong-Hwan tank Moth Grant Espe support . He joined as their analyst in 2018 and was the lone member of the preseason coaching staff to remain with them for the entire season.

Image credit: Vancouver Titans Twitter

He left the Shock in September and announced his search for a new team. Soon after, it was revealed that he left the Shock to pursue an offer to join the Justice coaching staff that never came.

For a time, it felt like Harsha was left without a job, but perhaps it was a stroke of luck.

In December it was revealed he was joining the Titans.

"Every other option I had seemed like good options at the time -- there are a bunch that aren't even public, actually -- [it turned out to be incredibly lucky for me that I didn't take offers with teams that] either passed me over or kind of shafted me," he said

"I was just floating around in free agency and then the Titans actually reached out to me. Their GM, Steve Maida from Luminosity, sent me a message and asked me if I wanted to work with the team."

"I deliberated for a couple of hours and I was like 'yeah, of course I want to work with the team.'"

And as simple as that, Harsha was on the staff for the team that has since become the best in the Overwatch League.

To secure the stage title, the Titans had to beat Harsha's old team in the final. He had to coach the Titans to defeat his former teammates and friends so they could become the first to earn a perfect stage.

"It did [mean more to me] but only because I think they were the second best team of the stage," he said. "If it was just my old team but I didn't think they were a good team, then it wouldn't mean that much. But I thought that because they improved so much and we got to face my old team it felt really good."

Harsha is in no way surprised by the Shock's success. He thought they were good in Stages 3 and 4 last season, but had issues with choking that prevented them from making the stage playoffs in either stage.

In fact, he was pretty confident early in the offseason.

"When I was leaving the team in September I remember telling [Sinatraa], 'don't worry, you guys are going to be a really good team.'"

The announcement of Harsha leaving the Shock came before it was publicly revealed that they traded for Smurf, before they promoted Rascal, before their addition of Viol2t and before they traded for Striker. Basically, at the time Harsha left the team, the only players officially confirmed on the roster were the ones from last season.

Of course, the Shock aren't the only team Harsha thinks will be good this season.

"People really push on the narrative that the Titans were only good because it's the same meta they've been playing for so long, I guess. Stage 2 and the future should prove that's not the case."

"It's just a good team."