Selesnick, Azorius Momo, Wins Washington DC Regional Championship

Azorius Momo earns RC trophy in ever-evolving Standard format

Momo, Friendly Flier illustrated by Brandon L Hunt

Jordan Selesnick won the Regional Championship at SCG CON Washington DC with Azorius Momo on Sunday.


In a field packed with Izzet Prowess and Mono-Green Landfall, Selesnick put the power of Azorius Momo on display — proving the power of strong metagaming and mulligan decisions. Selesnick regularly dug for better opening hands in tight matchups, allowing his deck to have starts similar to those in Modern as opposed to Standard. After an 8-1 start on Day 1, Selesnick cruised to the No. 1 seed in the Top 8 with a record of 12-1-2.

Once in the Top 8, Selesnick only dropped a single game in route to a dominant performance. He defeated Stephen Snelson, on Izzet Spellementals, 2-1 in the quarters before clean 2-0 wins against Alexander Kans, on Selesnya Aggro, and Matt Xu, on Mono-Green Landfall.

Selesnick showed off both types of powerful draws the Momo deck can have in the finals, blinking a Quantum Riddler into play on Turn 2 in Game 1, and landing a copied Sage of the Skies on Turn 2 in Game 2. With the fast starts and utility offered from Starfield Shepherd, Selesnick had no problem navigating the mid-games for fast wins facing down strong starts from Xu.


Selesnick took home $20,000 and the title of champion, while Xu earned $10,000. The Top 32 finishers earned invites to the upcoming Pro Tour in Amsterdam, though Selesnick and Xu also punched their tickets to the Magic World Championship.

Izzet Prowess made up almost 25 percent of the 1,198 players on Day 1, followed by Four-Color Control at 10 percent, thanks to its strong showing in the most recent Regional Championships. Mono-Green Landfall was next at just under nine percent, while Mardu Discard and Dimir Excruciator rounded out the Top 5 decks.

Day 2 consisted of 285 players that reached 18 match points on Day 1. See how the archetypes converted below.

View the Top 8 decklists from the Regional Championship. For all the decklists from the event and final standings check out the Melee page for the tournament.

Regional Championship Washington DC Top 8 from left: Lucas Birch, Krishna Pai, Jordan Selesnick, John Puglisi Clark, Sam Bogue, Matt Xu, Alexander Kans, and Stephen Snelson.

SCG CON will be back in action next in Las Vegas on June 26-28.