Another week has passed and we are less than a week from the Halo World Championships, where the top Halo teams in the world will be competing for their share of the 2.5 million dollar prize pool. With another week of scrimmages and preparation in the bag, we’re back to present to you our power rankings for this week. Before we get started, here is a quick look into the scrimmage records for all 16 of the teams competing next weekend (the ranks in this table reflect last week’s rankings), as well as a table displaying the personal power rankings of each of the five participating individuals.

Individual Power Ranks

Halo World Championship Power Rankings – Week of March 7th through March 13th

#1 Counter-Logic Gaming | SnakeBite, Royal 2, Frosty, Lethul

There’s really not much more that can be said about CLG’s dominance ever since they claimed first place at the North American Regionals. In the hundred total games they played this week across eight scrimmages, they only dropped nine games. CLG even managed to shut out Team Liquid and Cloud 9 in scrimmages against both teams, taking 13 out of 13 games in both cases. With all things considered not only are CLG the clear favorite to take first at Worlds, but their odds to do so are probably as good as the rest of the field combined.

#2 Evil Geniuses | Snipedown, Roy, Lunchbox, Commonly

Although Evil Geniuses remains in the #2 spot, their performance this week suggests that they’ve improved. Last week, EG won 62% of their games against Allegiance (8-5) whereas this week they’ve won 67% (22-11). Against Denial, they’ve improved from their 60% win rate (6-4) to 88% (14-2). The one thing EG does have going for them heading into the high-stakes Halo World Championship is the 43 combined event wins between veterans Snipedown, Roy, and Lunchbox, which undoubtedly gives them a mental edge against the rest of the teams competing in Hollywood in less than a week.

#3 Renegades | Ninja, Spartan, Victory X, Stellur

Last week, Renegades and Allegiance were neck and neck for the #3 and #4 spots. In three scrimmages against each other this week, Renegades got the best of Allegiance by securing 21 wins to Allegiance’s 16. On top of that, Renegades were able to snag an 8-3 scoreline against Denial, a 10-3 against Cloud 9, and a 5-0 sweep against the #1 Australian team Immunity. All in all, Renegades remain a somewhat reasonable beacon of hope for fans wanting to see a team other than CLG take home first place at the Halo World Championship.

#4 Team Allegiance | Naded, Suspector, El Town, Cratos

Allegiance stepped up their practice hours this week and secured a total of 105 games played against the rest of the HWC field. However, it wasn’t a quantity over quality type approach for Naded and friends, as 70 of their 105 games played this week were against #2 ranked Evil Geniuses (33 games) and #3 ranked Renegades (37 games). That level of practice may prove to be most helpful in the bracket stage of Worlds where Allegiance is very likely to match up with either of those two teams at some point.

#5 Team Liquid | Ace, Heinz, APG, Unlegit ▲2

At first glance, Team Liquid’s 23-52 scrimmage record this week may look a little discouraging to Liquid fans. However, if you remove the team’s two scrimmages against CLG (0-13 and 2-11) their record looks much more respectable at 21-28, especially if you take into account who they’ve played against. Liquid secured a quality win against #3 ranked Renegades (7-6) and played it extremely close with eLevate (5-6) and Denial (6-7). If Team Liquid can get some quality practice in this week and help turn some of the closer games around in their favor, there’s no reason to believe that they can’t beat some of these teams when $2,500,000 is up for grabs in less than a week.

#6 Denial eSports | Contra, Huke, bubu dubu, PreDevonator ▼1

After another week of practice, Denial has failed to show signs of progression after their stunning 2nd place finish at Regionals. They followed up last week’s 0-5 scrimmage record and 12-34 game record with just a 1-4 scrimmage record and 13-40 game record this week. It’s commendable that Denial spent the large majority of this week facing off against the top three teams, but they fared no better than the rest of the field considering they went 1-12 against #1 CLG, a combined 2-14 against #2 EG, and 3-8 against #3 Renegades.

#7 eLevate | SwiftKill, Calm, Penguin, Rayne ▲1

Here’s what resident HCS stats guru and fellow power ranker Tormented had to say about eLevate this week:

eLevate has shown a lot of improvement in the last few weeks. They went 4-3 this week in scrimmages, though their record is slightly misleading as about half of their series were against international teams. They did manage to beat Liquid 6-5 earlier in the week as well as Allegiance 3-2 in a short scrimmage. With Chig as their coach, I think this team may be poised to make a run, but I haven’t seen enough to move them up more than one spot since last week.

#8 Epsilon eSports | BUK57, BUK20, Snipedrone, Jimbo (NEW)

Coming in at #8 is the first ever non-North American team to grace the power rankings, Epsilon. With a 3-0-1 scrimmage record and by taking 25 of their 30 games this week, Epsilon has slid past fellow Group D member Cloud 9, who has been struggling as of late. What makes it even more interesting is that these two teams will be the two teams to kick off the Halo World Championship, as they are the first match scheduled for Friday morning.

That wraps it up for this week’s power rankings. With less than five days until the festivities begin, it will be interesting to see how these teams will use the time they have left to prepare for their time in Hollywood.

In the meantime, let us know your thoughts on this week’s power rankings and possibly share your own rankings of the Halo World Championship teams in our forums.