Field Level Media
08 Jun 2023, 08:49 GMT+10
Imperial Esports and G2 Esports both cruised to sweeps on Wednesday to open Group A action at the BLAST Premier Spring Final in Washington, D.C.
Imperial, who won the most recent BLAST event, the Spring American Showdown in April, won 16-3 on Overpass before pulling off a 16-14 victory on Vertigoto take down Team Vitality. G2 captured identical 16-11 wins on Vertigo and Inferno to dispatch Cloud9 -- which won the Spring European Showdown in April.
Marcelo "chelo" Cespedes led the all-Brazilian Imperial squad with 46 kills and a plus-16 kills-deaths ratio. Russia's Ilya "m0NESY" Osipov was the key cog for G2, racking up 43 kills to post a plus-11 K-D.
Team Vitality and Cloud9 will meet in an elimination match on Thursday, while Imperial Esports and G2 Esports will face off in a winners match, also on Thursday.
The eight-team BLAST Premier Spring Final features a double-elimination group stage, where the field has been split into two groups of four teams. Pool play opening-round winners face off to determine the group winner, while opening-round losers play for the third and final playoff spot.
All matches are best-of-three, with the winners of each group advancing to the semifinals of the playoffs. Runners-up of each group will move on to the quarterfinals of the playoffs as high seeds, while third-place finishers will head to the quarterfinals as low seeds. All playoff matches are also best-of-three in the single-elimination bracket.
The grand final is scheduled for Sunday, with the winner taking home $200,000 of the $425,000 prize pool. A victory in the grand final also grants qualification to the $1 million BLAST Premier World Final, which will be held Dec. 12-17 in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
There were also a pair of sweeps in Group B on Wednesday, as Heroic used wins on Inferno (16-7) and Nuke (16-6) to beat Complexity Gaming and FaZe Clan topped Astralis 16-5 on Overpass and 16-6 on Mirage.
Jakob 'jabbi' Nygaard paced the all-Danish Heroic squad with 42 kills and a plus-18 differential. FaZe got a balanced attack with Norway's Havard 'rain' Nygaard leading four players with at least 30 kills with a match-high 38. Russel 'Twistzz' Van Dulken of Canada produced a match-high plus-17 differential for the winners.
BLAST Premier: Spring Final 2023
Thursday's schedule
Group A
Winners Match
Imperial Esports vs. G2 Esports
Elimination Match
Team Vitality vs. Cloud9
Group B
Winners Match
Heroic vs. FaZe Clan
Elimination Match
Complexity Gaming vs. Astralis
Prize pool and BLAST Premier points distribution:
1. $200,000; 3,000 points; berth in World Final
2. $85,000; 2,000 points
3-4. $40,000; 1,200 points
5-6. $20,000; 500 points
7-8. $10,000, 300 points
--Field Level MediaGet a daily dose of Denmark Sun news through our daily email, its complimentary and keeps you fully up to date with world and business news as well.
Publish news of your business, community or sports group, personnel appointments, major event and more by submitting a news release to Denmark Sun.
More InformationLONDON, U.K.: An unrelenting heatwave sweeping across Europe has pushed early summer temperatures to historic highs, triggering deadly...
DUBLIN, Ireland: Tánaiste Simon Harris has called on the United States to use every hour to reach a zero-for-zero tariff agreement...
DUBLIN, Ireland: A blind woman from Dublin says she was hurt while getting off a bus because the driver refused to pull in close to...
DUBLIN, Ireland: The Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO) has warned that there could be a serious trolley crisis this summer...
ISTANBUL/PARIS/BRUSSELS: As searing temperatures blanket much of Europe, wildfires are erupting and evacuation orders are being issued...
NEW YORK CITY, New York: The U.S. dollar continues to lose ground, weighed down by growing concerns over Washington's fiscal outlook...
LONDON, U.K.: An unrelenting heatwave sweeping across Europe has pushed early summer temperatures to historic highs, triggering deadly...
ISTANBUL/PARIS/BRUSSELS: As searing temperatures blanket much of Europe, wildfires are erupting and evacuation orders are being issued...
More than 200kg of uranium enriched to 60% are missing, according to the journalist Last month's US strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities...
(Photo credit: Susan Mullane-Imagn Images) No. 23 seed Clara Tauson of Denmark moved into the fourth round at Wimbledon with a 7-6...
(Photo credit: JASON BEAN/RGJ / USA TODAY NETWORK) Belgium's Jasper Philipsen sprinted to victory in the opening stage of the 112th...
New Delhi [India], July 5 (ANI): A six-member Indian men's and women's skeet shooting squad will take first aim on Sunday (July 06,...