Team Vitality and Astralis moved on to the playoff semifinals at the Intel Extreme Masters Cologne event in Germany.
Vitality swept Cloud9 2-0 and Astralis did the same to Heroic in the quarterfinals Friday.
Saturday’s semifinal matches will pit Vitality against ENCE and Astralis against G2 Esports. ENCE and G2 earned berths straight into the semifinals by winning Groups A and B in the group stage.
On Friday, Vitality won a pair of close maps — 16-11 on Mirage and 19-17 in overtime on Inferno — to vanquish Cloud9. Frenchman Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut starred for Vitality by racking up 56 kills and a plus-21 kills-to-deaths differential. Russia’s Dmitry “sh1ro” Sokolov had 49 kills and a plus-8 to lead Cloud9.
Astralis, meanwhile, defeated Heroic 16-7 on Ancient and 16-11 on Inferno in a battle between two all-Danish squads. Christian “Buzz” Andersen had 49 kills with a plus-24 K-D for Astralis and teammate Nicolai “device” Reedtz added 47 kills and a plus-25. Casper “cadiaN” Moller posted 34 kills for Heroic.
The $1 million Counter-Strike: Global Offensive tournament began last Wednesday with 16 teams competing in the double-elimination play-in stage. Opening matches were best-of-one, with all additional matches best-of-three.
Eight teams advanced to the group stage, which also featured eight teams that previously qualified: G2 Esports, FaZe Clan, Team Vitality, ENCE, Heroic, Cloud9, Natus Vincere and GamerLegion.
A pair of group stages, both double-elimination with matches best-of-three, completed play Tuesday. Each group winner earned a berth in the playoff semifinals while the upper-bracket runners-up and lower-bracket winners got the four quarterfinal slots. The single-elimination playoffs run Friday through Sunday, with the quarterfinals and semifinals best-of-three and the grand final best-of-five.
The championship side will receive $400,000 and a berth in the 2024 IEM Katowice event. The runner-up will get $180,000.
The tournament will continue Saturday with two semifinal matches:
–ENCE vs. Team Vitality
–G2 Esports vs. Astralis
Intel Extreme Masters Cologne prize pool
1. $400,000, 2024 IEM Katowice berth
2. $180,000
3-4. $80,000
5-6. $40,000 — Cloud9, Heroic
7-8. $24,000 — GamerLegion, Natus Vincere
9-12. $16,000 — Fnatic, Monte, FaZe Clan, MOUZ
13-16. $10,000 — The MongolZ, 9INE, OG, Ninjas in Pyjamas
17-20. $4,500 — FURIA Esports, Apeks, Team Liquid, Imperial Esports
21-24. $2,500 — Into the Breach, Complexity Gaming, BIG, Grayhound Gaming
–Field Level Media
