Defending North American Champion wins first LAN of NHL 24 season

Samuel "CadCooks" Landry is the winner of the EA SPORTS NHL 24 All-Star Open, taking down Ethan "Polgz" Kerr-Polgar in the third game of a best-of-three series at the Hockey Hall of Fame. 

This was the first LAN event of the NHL 24 eSports season in the lead up to the World Championship. 

Polgz participated in last year's All-Star Open, while CadCooks is the defending North American Champion. Both play for Caps Gaming and are good friends outside the game.

"That was such a sweaty series, I got destroyed game one, I had to find a way to bounce back and I somehow did it," CadCooks told Carrlyn Bathe and Cameron "NoSleeves" Halbert after his victory. 

The wait after playing the first set of matches did not seem to impact Polgz, as he came out and scored early and often in game one, defeating CadCooks 9-3. 

Game two came with more drama, the two players traded goals and went in to overtime tied 6-6, where CadCooks scored almost immediately off the opening face off to force a winner take all game three. 

With everything on the line the defense turned up in game three, and it was the tighest checking game of all matches played at the tournament.

Related: NHL All-Star Open Finals set

Polgz opened the scoring to gain momentum but CadCooks put one home with three seconds left in the second period to tie the game at two. The two traded goals in the third period and the NHL All-Star Open went to overtime to decide the tournament

Overtime started off tense and after Polgz took a penalty CadCooks turned up the heat, getting robbed on several high danger chances including ringing a puck off the crossbar.

"I was trying not to overreact so I could stay focused but that was as wide open as it gets," CadCooks said post-game. 

Eventually his offensive pressure was too much for Polgz, and CadCooks buried the game winner on a "La Dany" shot to win the tournament. 

CadCooks appeared moments later for his interview, still shaking with excitement and adrenaline.

He expressed how important it is to not go down by multiple goals in this game, and gave Dany-Karl "Deeks" Levesque a shoutout for creating "La Dany." 

"Thank you to people supporting me on the stream, my parents are in Costa Rica right now and I sent them the link so they were watching me," said Cad. 

On top of his medal CadCooks takes home $2000 USD, while Polgz takes home $1000. All four finalists have earned a spot in the North American Bracket. 

Viewership peaked at a solid 700 on Twitch. 

For more updates on the All-Star Open and NHL eSports follow The Hockey News Gaming.