Shopify Rebellion came into the
Rocket League 2026 World Championship as North America’s second seed having enjoyed consistent international and domestic results over the season. However, they got off to a slow start in the Group Stage, failing to take a game off
Man City Esports in their first series. Quickly recovering, Shopify Rebellion convincingly defeated Bigodes before subduing their North American rivals,
NRG, 3-2 to make the Playoffs. They became the fifth North American team to reach the top-eight with a strong 4-1 victory over French contenders,
Team Vitality.
Sheep Esports talked with Jason "Firstkiller" Corral after the Team Vitality series, where he reflected on the crowd’s support, Angel "kofyr" Lopez’s confidence as a player and why North America is on top at this event.
What is your assessment of the tournament so far?
Jason "Firstkiller" Corral: “The group stage was rough. We got swept by Man City so it wasn’t a great start. We’ve been working everyday to make sure we get back to the form that we know we can play at. Today, we were just really confident and the vibes were really high, so that helped us to win.
Obviously there has to be a big difference between 100s of Paris attendees booing you on stage versus an entire stadium cheering you on. Does that give you a different energy with the crowd behind you?
Firstkiller: I definitely felt a lot more excited to play, it was very fun for me. Normally, when I get booed I tune them out but when they’re cheering for me, I take that energy and I use it.
You’ve competed with Lj (Logan Wilt) for over two years now. How has that chemistry grown over the years?
Firstkiller: I always know what he wants to do on the ball and he understands how I want to play as well. It’s not exactly like twins but you just know each other really well and you can play well together.
What were you able to learn from EWC coming into this?
Firstkiller: We kind of threw against Spacestation Gaming in that tournament, we should have closed it out 4-1. We looked back and talked about it. We started to rush the finish to win that series, we just had to take our time and that’s what we did today.
Do you think it should have been possible in this format for the North America first and second seeds to be in the same group?
Firstkiller: I honestly don’t really like the format at all. I wish it was just swiss because I think it's the most fair and the best format for sure. It was kind of weird we had NRG, but we should have at least got second seed in our group.
It's fairly rare in your career to compete with someone who’s just starting their career relatively. How has Kofyr (Angel Lopez) grown on your team recently? How has he been competing?
Firstkiller: He’s a very confident person. I never have to reassure him or anything like that. He’s got aura, he’s oozing with confidence. It’s always nice to play with him. He’s got so much confidence that if we lose a game or lose a scrim, it doesn’t affect him at all. Honestly, he doesn’t seem like a rookie or someone who is just starting out at all. He seems like he’s been playing for so many years and it's really nice to have.
What do you think has happened at this event for North America to be this dominant versus the world?
I think a lot of it has to do with these other teams and other regions underestimating us. We’re not terrible players who can’t compete. The teams are also putting in a lot of work and now we have a lot more discipline. Before we used to clip a lot, but now it's like a playstyle for every team. It's doing good and these other teams can’t handle it.
