I really hope this stupid tournament arc comes to a finish soon. They always go the same way.
Nothing before the last match matters. In these team-based ones it always ends up so the last match decides everything. In individual one-on-one tournaments, the protagonist always makes it to the final against their big rival... so again the last match decides everything.
Well, not always, but almost always. If it was going to go differently, I expect it would have by now.
Tournament arcs are the absolute cancer of fighting series.