Minnesota R KKR (right) plays against OpTic Texas on the main live stage during the Call of Duty League Pro-Am Classic esports tournament at Belong Gaming Arena in Columbus on May 6, 2022. Natus Vincere, Astralis, SAW and The MongolZ swept their opponents 2-0 in Group A at the Intel Extreme Masters in Cologne, Germany on Saturday.
All four teams advanced to the upper bracket semifinals with their wins. Natus Vincere defeated paiN Gaming, Astralis defeated 9z Team, SAW defeated G2 Esports, and The MongolZ took Team Spirit’s best performance.
Sixteen teams competed in the double-elimination phase of the $1 million Counter-Strike: Global Offensive tournament.
The group stage begins on Saturday and runs through Tuesday, with two double-elimination matches featuring eight players in each group. The first place in the group advances directly to the play-off semi-finals. The second-placed team in the group advances to the quarterfinals of the playoffs as a higher-seeded team, and the third-placed team in the group advances to the quarterfinals of the playoffs as a lower-seeded team.
The single-elimination tournament begins on Friday and ends on August 18. The winner qualifies for the IEM Katowice event and the BLAST Premier World Finals, as well as a $400,000 prize.
Natus Vincere won 13-4 on both Anubis and Mirage on Saturday. Ukrainian player Valeriy “b1t” Vakhovskiy scored a game-high 29 kills and ended the game with 9 kills and deaths.
Denmark’s Victor “Staehr” Staehr had 35 kills and a KD of over 9 points to help Astralis win Dust II 13-10 and 13-5 Get off Inferno.
SAW won on Nuke (13-5) and Inferno (13-10) with 33 kills and a +12 KD ratio from Portugal’s Michel “ewjerkz” Pinto.
Mongolian player Ayush “mzinho” Batbold had 41 kills and 26 deaths to lead MongolZ to a 16-13 victory on Ancient, setting the tone for a 13-4 victory on Anubis.
Four teams from Group B competed on Saturday, with Complexity Gaming defeating Virtus.pro 2-1 and FaZe Clan defeating Team Liquid 2-0.
Complexity Gaming’s match against VP ended with a 13-6 win on Vertigo before losing 16-14 on Dust II. They then defeated Anubis 13-5 to stay in the upper bracket.
FaZe Clan picked up wins over Mirage (13-11) and Nuke (13-10).
The group stage continues with six games on Sunday:
——Natus Vincere vs. Astralis (Group A Winners Bracket Semifinals)
–SAW vs. MongolZ (Group A winner group semi-finals)
–paiN Gaming vs. 9z Team (Group A, loser group quarterfinals)
——G2 Esports vs. Team Spirit (Group A quarterfinals)
–MOUZ vs. Team Falcons (Group B quarterfinals)
——FURIA Esports vs. Team Vitality (Group B Winner Group Quarterfinals)
Intel Extreme Masters Cologne prize pool, including prize money and BLAST Premier points
1. $400,000, 3,000 points
2. $180,000, 2,000 points
3-4. USD 80,000, 1,200 points
5-6. $40,000, 500 points
7-8. $24,000, 300 points
9-12. $16,000, no points
13-16. $10,000, no points
17-20. $4,500, no points – BIG, HEROIC, MIBR, Eternal Fire
21-24. $2,500, no points — ALTERNATE aTTaX, 3DMAX, Imperial Esports, FlyQuest
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