page_title: Dallas Fuel
section_title: Early years: 2018–present
hierarchical_section_title: Dallas Fuel / Franchise history / Early years: 2018–present
caption_attribution_description: English: Head coach of the Dallas Fuel Aaron "Aero" Atkins. Cropped screenshot.
context_page_description: Dallas Fuel is an American professional Overwatch team based in Dallas, Texas. The Fuel compete in the Overwatch League as a member of the league's Pacific West Division.
  Founded in 2017, Dallas Fuel is one of the league's twelve founding members and is one of two professional Overwatch teams based in Texas. The Fuel became the first team to play a home match, as they hosted the "Dallas Fuel Homestand Weekend" at the Allen Event Center in 2019; Dallas will host five homestands in 2020 at various locations. The team is owned by esports organization Envy Gaming, who also own Team Envy. Team Envy runs their own Overwatch division that competes in Overwatch Contenders as an academy team for the Fuel.
  Kyle "KyKy" Souder was appointed the team's first head coach, but after a disappointing first-half of the 2018 season, he was replaced by Aaron "Aero" Atkins. Aero led the team to a Stage 4 playoff berth in 2018 but has yet to bring the Fuel to the season playoffs.
context_section_description: In December 2017, the Fuel went undefeated in the first ever Overwatch League preseason. Shortly afterwards on January 10, 2018, the Fuel began their inaugural regular season campaign. Their debut match resulted in a 1–2 loss to early season favorites the Seoul Dynasty. They would struggle for the remainder of Stage 1, and end up finishing with a 3–7 record in 10th place, which did not reflect how the team did previously as Team Envy. The Fuel finished Stage 2 in 11th place with a 2–8 record. Early in Stage 3, head coach KyKy and DPS player Rascal were released after some in fighting between the two. The team's only victory in the stage was over the winless Shanghai Dragons, making their stage record 1–9. The team signed Fusion University head coach Aaron “Aero” Atkins before the fourth stage began. The Fuel would go on to achieve a season-high 6 wins, including victories against top-6 opponents the Valiant, Uprising, Spitfire, and Fusion. The record would be good enough for a 4th place finish and the team's first ever stage playoffs berth. In the stage semi-finals, the team would lose 2–3 against back-to-back stage champions New York Excelsior, the match marking the end of their season, as they would finish in 10th place with a record of 12–28.
  In their first full season under head coach Aaron "Aero" Atkins, the team looked to improve on their disappointing 12–28 record from 2018. Dallas began the 2019 season posting an impressive 4–2 record through six games, but a 2–3 loss in the final match of the stage to the Boston Uprising eliminated the team from Stage 1 Playoff contention. The team hit their stride in Stage 2, amassing a 5–2 record, and qualified for the Stage 2 Playoffs. However, they were knocked out in the quarterfinals round by the Vancouver Titans in a 0–3 loss. The Fuel fell apart in the final half of the season, finding only one win in their final fourteen matches. With a 10–18 record for the season, the Fuel again did not qualify for the season playoffs.
caption: Aaron "Aero" Atkins took over as head coach in 2018 Stage 4.
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