The BLAST Premier Spring Showdown was full of surprises. Some lesser known teams performed really well beating top ten teams like Liquid and Vitality.
At the end of the tournament there were clear victors and teams deservedly securing the spot in the Spring Final.
The round of 16
First things first: where did Astralis go? They were kicked out from the start, being 2-0’d by none other than OG. Inferno was a strong OG showing with a 16-7 result and Astralis made it a much closer affair on Dust2, bringing it to overtime. Sadly for the Danes, the overtime made no difference, as OG triumphed regardless. Meanwhile, G2 got the win over Endpoint with a 2-0 themselves too, shooting them down in two strong but sometimes challenging maps. It was the strength of players like AmaNEk that made the difference for G2
Further down the line, we got one of the first surprises in the round of 16. Liquid did really not have a good day. Dignitas is not a bad team by any means but for Liquid to be taken down on Nuke with a whopping 5-16 and a relatively better 13-16 on Vertigo says enough. The only thing in their defence is the fact that HEAP was a relentless strength for Dignitas in opening up the bombsites on Vertigo.
On the other side of the coin Spirit clearly knew how to deal with Extra Salt’s saltiness. They popped off especially hard on the second half of Dust2, making it feel as if they were completely done with the map and ready to finish things off. A clear cut 2-0 for them as well to secure a spot in the quarter-finals.
Gambit, the number one team in the world at the time of writing faced hands down the easiest possible opponent. NASR, a sub-top 100 ranked team stood no chance against them and they were taken out in quick fashion. FURIA found more resistance when they took on MIBR but still succeeded, after a finnicky start on Mirage. Vertigo was more their game, but chelo on the MIBR side deserves an honourable mention for his insane shots.
The last two matchups of the round of 16 showed Heroic showing why they are currently in the top three of the world. SAW stood no chance and were grossly outclassed, managing to get ten rounds in total over two maps. The more interesting match was Vitality versus 9z; namely, 9z in most unexpected fashion got the win. A team ranked at 88 at the time of writing knowing how to beat a team 80 ranks above them is unheard of. Yet it still happened. The man of that match without any possible doubt was try – he did not just try, but greatly succeeded.
Quarter-finals
In the quarter-finals the most exciting match of them all started things off. G2 made for an incredibly tense best of three; a triple overtime on Nuke for starters followed by a fantastic and dominant OG Dust2, leaving Inferno as a classic decider. G2 showed their supremacy and won the BO3 with a 16-12.
Spirit was up against Dignitas next; a strong start from Dignitas gave the impression that they were happy to beat a team far outranking them once more, but after Nuke, Spirit bit back hard. They did not even let Dignitas get double digits in their of the two subsequent maps and so won the match. One of the secrets to Spirit their success was degster.
Gambit and FURIA duked it out on all three maps as the teams before them did, but here it seemed more as if FURIA taking a map was a close cut accident. They won Overpass with 16-14, but on Mirage and Train, Gambit was the clear victor, only allowing FURIA a mere six or five rounds respectively. The key to success was their consistently strong defence.
The last match showed how 9z their win over Vitality was perhaps a stroke of luck more than anything. Now they had to take on none other than Heroic. They held out respectably, but could not win any maps off them, succumbing after an 8-16 result on Mirage, and a 12-16 Inferno result shortly afterwards. Still, a lot of respect to the team for making it this far and putting in such a fantastic effort.
One more to go
The first semi-final of the day saw G2 going up against Spirit. It was written in the stars that this would be a delightfully tense semi-final, and it certainly proved to be. Initially, G2 had to overcome a big hurdle after facing a 6-16 loss on the first map, Mirage. Luckily for them they succeeded as they took Dust2 with 16-12. Everything was going to be decided on Nuke, down to an overtime no less. It was a perfect showing of how close these teams are to each other performance wise. G2 started incredibly well with 11-4 in their first half, which Spirit bounced back from perfectly. It was however thanks to players like nexa that even with a fantastic Spirit comeback, it still came to overtime.
This overtime eventually went to G2 as JaCkz first took some excellent multi-kills on the attacking side and huNter- lately got one of his own, with a triple kill to close out the map and put G2 in the BLAST Premier Spring Final.
The second semi-final saw Gambit against Heroic. A repeat of what happened in the ESL Pro League a week earlier, just a tad shorter with the winning sides reversed. Gambit took the 2-1 as they kicked off on Inferno with 16-6, not even granting Heroic a single round in the second half. This immediately forced Heroic into action as they responded with a 16-9 win on Vertigo, achieved through consistent and cohesive plays.
Everything came down to Train, where Gambit and Heroic were at each other’s throats. The rounds were nail-biting and at times just one second could have changed the outcome, but eventually Gambit reigned supreme, taking Train from Heroic and getting revenge for the ESL Pro League. As Train goes to them with 16-12, they qualify for the BLAST Premier Spring Final and are shared winners of the Showdown along with G2.
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