Paintball Magazine Paintball.Media Magazine August 2019 | Page 19
Stop number three on the 2019 National
Xball League (NXL) tour was held in Blue Bell
(Valley Forge), Pennsylvania, just outside of
Philadelphia. Previous recent NXL seasons
have seen the league’s third event held in
Atlantic City, New Jersey but the league
felt it was time for a venue change. Set in a
beautiful residential area, the venue, a soccer
field complex, offered plenty of flat green
grass fields and paved parking. Heavy rains
leading up to the event soaked the grounds
and although it hardly rained at all during
the event, the green grass quickly became
a soggy muddy mess. To their credit, the
league wasted no time and spared no
expense to create thick plywood walkways
throughout the common areas of the venue.
As the event began the heavy rain would
taper off to an occasional sprinkle and by
mid-day Friday there would be nothing buy
sunshine.
Coming into the Philly Open it was a
rejuvenated Moscow Red Legion team sitting
atop the NXL Professional leaderboard,
with a fourth place finish in Las Vegas and a
first place win in Texas. Not far behind was
Houston Heat with second and fourth place
finishes in the league’s opening two events.
A Las Vegas win and a sixth place showing in
Texas had Edmonton Impact in third place.
Just a few seed points behind Impact was ac:
Dallas after fifth and second place showings
in Vegas and Texas.
For three years now each NXL Professional
division event winner has come from a pool
of three teams: Edmonton Impact, Houston
Heat and Moscow Red Legion. San Diego
Dynasty’s win in early 2017 was the last time
an event winner didn’t come from the “big
three.” Could it be ac: Dallas, Dynasty, or
X-Factor’s turn?
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