This past weekend, eSports teams from world over participated in one of the biggest events in pro gaming for the year: the IEM Global Challenge Kiev. Counter-Strike, StarCraft II, and League of Legends matches were all held with some of the best players in the world competing. Here’s the run down on what happened:
Counter-Strike
Eight teams entered the groupstage for the Counter-Strike tournament, but only Fnatic, Na`Vi, Moscow Five, and SK Gaming walked out to face each other in the finals. While making their way into the playoffs is good news for any team, Na`Vi had not even originally qualified for the tournament, and only had a chance to participate as a replacement.
The first team they were facing was Fnatic. Walking out of the groupstage undefeated and with the first place seed, Fnatic was the favorite. Na`Vi on the other hand finished behind SK Gaming in their group, which left them in fourth for the playoff matches. If anything, that reality only seemed to make them play even more expertly. Despite Fnatic’s excellent play in the groupstage, they were defeated by Na`Vi in two close matches on both de_inferno and de_tuscan.
SK, on the other hand, reached the top of their group as well, and found themselves facing Moscow Five. In an exciting 21-17 match on de_mirage, SK was able to take the win. They followed that up with another win on de_train, defeating Moscow Five.
For a team that almost hadn’t been able to attend the tournament, Na`Vi now faced off against the eSports titan that is SK Gaming. Once again, they did not faulter. With two utterly dominating wins on both de_inferno and de_train, Na`Vi was able to shut down SK to win the tournament with an incredible underdog story.
To round out the event, Fnatic and M5 faced off for third place. Although Fnatic took the first map on de_train, Moscow Five took the wins on both de_nuke and de_inferno.
StarCraft II
StarCraft II is unquestionably one of the most popular eSports in the world, and it had a big showing at IEM Kiev. Fresh out of the group stage and into the quarterfinals, the local players were doing well. The Ukranian players dimaga, White-Ra, and Kas all were able to quality for round one.
Also in the playoffs were Pomi, NaNiwa, Zenio, first time IEM player Feast, and the Korean titan that is MMA. After the first round, with half the players being eliminated, it became a South Korea vs Ukraine battle. Although White-Ra had been knocked out by fellow Ukranian Kas, both Kas and dimaga were left to face off against the Koreans Zenio and MMA.
Well, sort of. Actually, the matches in round two would determine which Korean would face off against which Ukranian. Dimaga and Kas went head to head with dimaga taking the victory 3-2. Admittedly as expected, MMA trounced Zenio with a solid 3-0 win.
Battling over Taldarim Alter, Shakuras Plataeu, Terminus SE, and finally Metalopolis, dimaga and MMA battled for the first place victory and the largest share of the prize pool. Although the crowd favorite, dimaga fell 1-3 to MMA’s excellent play.
In the third place match, Kas was able to claim a 3-2 victory over Zenio.
League of Legends
Riot’s incredibly popular MOBA has become a strong staple of IEM and that held true in Kiev. Although many of the top League of Legends teams are usually expected to not just get into the play offs – and SK Gaming, Team Dignitas, and Team SoloMid predictably did – more and more teams are becoming active and displaying excellent skill. Moscow Five’s LoL team did an excellent job of showing that by placing at the top of Group B, above Team Dignitas, to enter into the finals.
That was a strong start for the Russian team. While expected to play well, no one expected just how well they would end up performing. When they faced off against SK Gaming, one of the top European teams, they took an unexpected 2-0 victory.
Team Solomid had just came off of a healthy 2-0 victory of their own against Team Dignitas when they came to face Moscow Five. Solomid, regarded as one of the best teams in the entire world, did well against the Russian team. Doing well, in this case, meant winning one game. Proving that the LoL scene will be seeing new, budding talent, Moscow five proved without a doubt that there is yet another LoL team out there that fans will need to pay close attention to.
Dignitas and SK faced each other in the third place match, with Team Dignitas taking the win 2-1.
