The playoff stage of the SK Gaming HoN Tournament #1 powered by Steelseries and Bigfoot Networks has been wrapped up and now it's time for the two remaining contestants, Empire Gaming and Jokes on you , to battle it out and determine the winner of our first Heroes of Newerth tournament!

After the conclusion of the group stage, not many would have predicted these two teams to make it all the way to the finals, but they both managed to string a couple of excellent matches to do so!

Quarterfinal results

Evil Geniuses 0-2 Reason Gaming
Dirty Minds 0-2 Empire Gaming
DuskBin 0-2 SK Gaming
Jokes on you 2-1 Infused.Tt eSPORTS

Two major upsets happened already in the first round as the up and coming Reason Gaming dismantled the heavily favored Evil Geniuses, wowing the crowd with another impressive performance after they already eliminated fnatic from the tournament during the group stage.

The Russians of Empire Gaming defeated Dirty Minds fairly convincingly, as they were obviously boosted by their group stage tiebreaker victory over Online Kingdom which meant they'll participate in the playoffs.

SK Gaming was probably more confident than some expected in their match-up against DuskBin as well, as they 2-0'd them to proceed to the semis.

The infamous Jokes on you team managed to come out on top of Infused in the only match of this round that had to go to a three game series.

Semifinal results

Reason Gaming 0-2 Empire Gaming
SK Gaming 0-2 Jokes on you

Reason Gaming's Cindarella story came to an abrupt halt as they smashed head first into the Russian iron courtain. Empire Gaming performed phenomenally in both matches, as they did throughout the tournament, and the Swedes had to go home. Still, their run was very impressive indeed and is an announcement of what we can expect from them in the future.

The North American duke out went into the hands of the Canadians, as they absolutely embarrassed SK Gaming with two easy 20 minute stomps and they certainly deserved their first appearance in a tournament final with this reformed roster. SK Gaming on the other hand will certainly be disappointed with this performance, especially considering they were dubbed one of the favorites to win the first tournament hosted by their organization.

3rd place match

Reason Gaming vs SK Gaming

The match will be played this Saturday (9th April 2011.) at 18:00 CET / noon EST. Make sure to tune in to the livestream by either Honcast.com or Gamereplays.org to find out who'll take home the consolation prize!

GRAND FINAL

Empire Gaming vs Jokes on you

The match will be played this Sunday (10th April 2011.) at 16:00 CET / 10AM EST.

Livestream will, as always, be provided by our coverage partners Honcast.com and Gamereplays.org!