Team Spirit and 9z Team completed unbeaten runs through group play at the 2024 Intel Extreme Masters Dallas event on Wednesday, earning a bye into the semifinals of the playoffs.
Playing in the upper-bracket final of their respective groups, Spirit and 9z both swept their opponents on Wednesday. They won’t play again until the playoff semifinals on Saturday.
Sixteen teams competed in the Counter-Strike: Global Offensive tournament’s double-elimination group stage. The teams were split into a pair of eight-team groups, with the winner of each group advancing to the playoff semifinals. The group runners-up will next play in the quarterfinals as the high seeds, while the third-place finishers will face them as the low seeds.
All matches in the single-elimination playoff bracket are best-of-three, and the grand final is scheduled for Sunday.
The winner of the tournament will receive $100,000, 1,400 BLAST Premier points and a spot in the 2024 IEM Cologne event in Germany, scheduled for Aug. 7-18.
Team Spirit got the Group B upper-bracket final started first and made quick work of FaZe Clan, winning 13-11 on Anubis and 13-10 on Nuke for the sweep. Russian Boris ‘magixx’ Vorobiev led Spirit with a team-high 38 kills and a plus-13 kill-death differential. Dmitry ‘sh1ro’ Sokolov and Danil ‘donk’ Kryshkovets each had 35 kills in the win.
In the Group A upper-bracket final, 9z won 13-9 on Dust before needing to do a little more work to take Anubis 16-14 and knock Team Vitality into the playoff quarterfinals. Uruguay’s Franco ‘dgt’ Garcia paced the victory with 47 kills and a plus-13 differential. Compatriot Maximiliano ‘max’ Gonzalez added 41 kills.
The final playoff spot from Group A went to G2 Esports thanks to their 2-1 win over Team Liquid in the lower-bracket final.
In Group B, HEROIC beat Natus Vincere in one lower-bracket semifinal and BIG topped Virtus.pro in the other. In the lower-bracket final, HEROIC swept BIG 2-0 to nab Group A’s final playoff spot.
Play resumes Friday with the two quarterfinal matches. 9z and Spirit will play a quarterfinal winner in the semifinals on Saturday.
Friday’s semifinal matches:
–FaZe Clan vs. G2 Esports
–Team Vitality vs. HEROIC
Prize pool / standings:
1. $100,000, 1,400 BLAST Premier points, qualification to IEM Cologne 2024
2. $42,000, 1,000 BLAST Premier points
3-4. $20,000, 600 BLAST Premier points
5-6. $10,000, 400 BLAST Premier points
7-8. $6,000, 300 BLAST Premier points (Team Liquid, BIG)
9-12. $5,000 (Virtus.pro, Natus Vincere, Team Falcons, MOUZ)
13-16. $4,000 (FlyQuest, M80, Monte, Complexity Gaming)
–Field Level Media