2000 Angry Hermit with Plow Under, Gaea’s Cradle, and Deranged Hermit, vs 2016 Flash and its subsequently-banned Reflector Mage. It seemed certain that when Hermit was on the play and got a turn 3 Plow Under, it would win, but how often would that actually happen?

G1: Hermit wins the roll, and gets Turn 3 Avalanche Riders into Turn 4 Plow Under into Turn 5 Skyshroud Poacher with plenty of time to get Deranged Hermit while the Flash deck rebuilt its mana base. Actually, the Flash deck got some blockers out and was starting to stabilize, but double Arc Lightning finished the deck off. Angry Hermit 1-0.

G2: A turn 3 Dec in Stone takes out 2 just-played Birds of Paradise, but that doesn’t stop the Hermit deck. Both decks are short on lands for a while and the game goes long. Rattlechains starts slowly whittling down the Hermit deck’s life total, with 2 Stasis Snares keeping things under control, but back to back Plow Unders give the Hermit deck an opening to play some spells without interference. By the time the Flash deck gets to 5 lands, the hermit deck has 4 squirrels, a hermit, poacher, masticore, and a BoP. Avacyn keeps the flash deck alive during one big attack, but the following turn a subsequent go-wide attack followed by Arc Lightning makes the difference. Hermit 2-0. “I like my odds,” I recall saying, up two games in a best-of-five. Ah, how I would eat those words.

G3: Reflector Mage sends back a Rofellos and seriously interrupts the mana ramping. Gideon comes down turn 4 and makes a knight. Already, the Hermit deck is at 15 life. It plays poacher. Turn 5 no blocks to keep poacher alive so the Hermit deck takes a hit from Gideon and co. and goes to 6 life, but the Hermit player now has Gaea’s Cradle. All this time, the UW Flash deck has played a land each turn. On turn 6 (with 6 lands) the Flash deck attacks into a suddenly appearing Hermit and squirrels, and the Hermit deck goes to 1 life. Then Hermit gets another hermit and has a horde of 3/3 squirrels, so Gideon makes an emblem and disappears – because a 2nd Gideon is in hand, so Gideon returns. The emblem is key, as the 3/3 squirrels are now facing several cards with 4 toughness instead of 3. Plow Under buys some time and a 3rd Deranged Hermit creates even more blockers, but being at 1 life makes things tricky. On turn 8 the Flash deck gets a Selfless Spirit which is ominous for an opponent at 1 life, but an attack with 5 4/4 squirrels and a few others forces the block, so Spirit goes down. Then, the critical topdeck saves the day: Declaration in Stone. 5 Squirrels turn into statues. The game goes long, but Gideon is still around gaining value. The Hermit deck reassembles a smaller army, but Fumigate destroys them, and the Flash deck finally, about 6 turns later, is able to do that 1 last point of damage. UW Flash 1-2. Staying Alive…

G4: A mulligan to 6. A Treetop Village. A Turn 3 Blastoderm. Turn 4 Gaea’s Cradle and a 2nd Blastoderm. And here’s the crucial mistake: to put pressure on the Flash deck’s life total, I don’t send everyone at Gideon, figuring the life points are just as good as killing Gideon since I’m the beatdown. But Avacyn flashes in and keeps Gideon alive at 1 loyalty. The Flash deck stabilizes at 5 life and the Blastoderms fade away. I play Poacher. It gets killed by Dec in Stone. I play Hermit. It gets killed by Dec in Stone #2. Dec in Stone #2! Ouch. After that, I get flooded and lose quickly. Hermit 2-2.

G5: Both players get bad hands. Flash mulligans to 6. Hermit mulligans to 5. (Remember, we are playing with the old scry mulligan still.) Neither player has much action. 2 Birds of Paradise vs. a Thraben Inspector. The Inspector starts attacking – for 6 turns!!! The Flash player’s hand is full of counterspells. Once the Hermit player has enough mana to try for two spells in a turn, it plays Masticore into Spell Queller, followed by Hermit… into Void Shatter. The next turn an Arc Lightning gets countered by Negate. Westvale Abbey enters the board and starts making dudes. The Spell Queller starts attacking. 3 Blastoderms are no good against the Westvale tokens, and later a Blessed Alliances forces one Blastoderm to sacrifice itself, after the birds have chump blocked, and gradually, oh so gradually, the Hermit deck gets knocked out of the tournament thanks to Spell Queller attacking for 6 turns. A long slow death for Hermit. UW Flash wins, 3-2.