OTE Finals Preview

The 2024 OTE Finals are finally here, with the City Reapers and RWE set to face off in a best-of-five series to determine the third OTE Championship. The first game of the series will be played this Friday at 7PM, as the second seeded Reapers play host to the fourth seeded RWE 🏆

OTE Finals Schedule:

📍 Friday, March 8th - RWE vs. City Reapers (Prime Video)

📍 Saturday, March 9th - RWE vs. City Reapers (YouTube)

📍 Thursday, March 14th - City Reapers vs. RWE (Prime Video)

📍 Friday, March 15th - City Reapers vs. RWE (YouTube, if nec.)

📍 Sunday, March 17th - RWE vs. City Reapers (YouTube, if nec.)

The path these two teams took to get here may not have been the most conventional, but the City Reapers and RWE have proved time and time again that they are the two best teams in the league, which sets up for what should be an exhilarating final series. The Reapers held down one of the top two spots for almost the entirety of the season ,as they have the league’s top defense, holding their opponents to a league-low 74.7 PPG. RWE showed in the pre-season what their talent was capable of, but injuries derailed that promise for most of the season. However, over the last month a now fully-healthy RWE squad is realizing that pre-season potential, yet to drop a game in the playoffs, and are beating their opponents by an average of 8.3 PPG 💪

The Reapers and RWE have played three times this season, with the Reapers besting RWE in two out of three meetings. The two teams first met in mid-December when the Reapers were undefeated and RWE had yet to capture a win, which made RWE’s upset win over the Reapers all the sweeter, as they took home a narrow 77-73 victory. In their next meeting in late December, the Reapers got their revenge, downing RWE 71-67 thanks to a well-rounded performance in which four players broke the double-digit point threshold. Their third and final meeting in mid-January was the most uneven meeting of the three, as the Reapers dominated from start to finish with a 85-72 win 💀

This contest will feature its fair share of enticing individual matchups, as these two teams and their players have a lot of shared history. Throughout the entire series, one matchup that will be featured is the battle of the future Yellowjackets, as the City Reapers Jaeden Mustaf and RWE’s Darrion Sutton, both set to attend Georgia Tech next season, will both attempt to slow the other's elite offense. The two highest rated high school basketball prospects left in the tournament are the City Reapers Bryson Tiller and RWE’s Karter Knox, both of whom have led their respective teams in scoring in the playoffs thus far, and the two will match up defensively for much of the series. Somto Cyril and Jah Jackson will each have their hands full trying to slow down their opponents relentless paint attacks, while both are also highly efficient offensive weapons of their own - they are the top two in FG% in the playoffs so far 🤩

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The City Reapers are looking to repeat as champions, after winning the OTE Finals in 2023, and are well-positioned to accomplish just that. The Reapers took down the third seeded Cold Hearts in three games in the semi-finals and put together a truly dominant performance in the third game. For much of the season the Reapers have taken a team-first, win by committee approach as they didn’t have a single player in the Top-10 scorers at the end of the regular season, however, that has begun to change in the playoffs. Second-Team All-OTE member Jahki Howard was dialed in, finishing with a game-high 22 points and attacking the rim relentlessly with five dunks on the night. Amari Evans, the 2024 Defensive Player of the Year, has been stellar in the playoffs, averaging a league-best 3.3 SPG, including five in the Reapers win-or-go-home game against the Cold Hearts 🔒

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Fourth seeded RWE have been the most dominant team in the playoffs, repping a perfect 4-0 record through two rounds of action. In RWE’s semi-final sweep over the #1 seed YNG Dreamerz, Knox proved once again that he is a force to be reckoned with, averaging 25 PPG and getting to the rim at will. Playing against a bigger and more athletic Reapers team, Knox is going to need to continue finding his way to the rim if he wants to capture the same amount of success he had in the first two rounds. All-OTE Second-Team member Daquan Davis has been showing off his skillset in the playoffs, leading the league with 8.0 APG, while also still landing in the Top-10 in scoring with 18.0 PPG. After missing the majority of the regular season, Nathan Missia-Dio returned for the start of the playoffs and brought with him an improved three-point shooting stroke at a 47.4% clip, a top five mark in the playoffs 👌

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Games 1 and 3 of the finals will be featured on Prime Video, while the remaining games will all be aired on OTE’s YouTube channel 🍿

For the best OTE highlights, follow us on IG and TikTok 😮‍💨

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