Natus Vincere has been struggling recently at big CS2 esports events. Winning this tournament sure feels good, but only one team at StarSeries Fall 2025 was a relatively decent challenge for NAVI.
The competitive calendar of Counter-Strike 2 (CS2) has reached the point where two rather big tournaments overlap. Some top teams chose to skip both to rest before even bigger events. While most elite squads were battling at FISSURE Playground #2, NAVI secured the title at StarSeries Fall 2025.
The prize pool at StarLadder StarSeries Fall 2025 was alright: $500,000 to share between all the teams, with $200,000 specifically for the winners. At the same time, only Ninjas in Pyjamas among the close-to-high-ranked teams decided to join the party with NAVI.
For Natus Vincere, this tournament was a nice chance to work on the recent coordination issues. The Major winners experienced a drastic drop in their tournament results.
Beating smaller kids on the block: NAVI dominates StarSeries Fall 2025
Eight teams participated in this CS2 esports event. If you follow big tournaments, you may not even know at least half of them. And the rest — well, the organizations are big, but their CS2 achievements are obscure.
NAVI started with a weird move: losing 8:13 on Ancient to 9INE. Everything went normally after that, and Natus Vincere lost no map until their ultimate victory.
Ninjas in Pyjamas was the other potential contender at StarSeries Fall 2025 — but only because NAVI's phase of disorganization. NiP were 9th–12th at IEM Cologne 2025 and 5th–8th at PGL Astana 2025.
After beating substantially smaller teams, Ninjas in Pyjamas faced NAVI twice: in the winners final and the grand final. They won no map, though.
The fans are happy, but they want more!
NAVI is obviously in turmoil at the moment. The team was 3rd–4th at IEM Cologne 2025 and then lost an opening match at the CS2 Esports World Cup 2025 and became unable to qualify for the main events at BLAST Bounty Fall and BLAST Open Fall.
A new player joined the roster of NAVI recently. Drin “makazze” Shaqiri replaced Justinas “jL” Lekavičius in July.
If that was a period of adaptation between the players, it should be over for now. Winning StarSeries Fall 2025 may be a good sign. But the fans want at least similar results in tournaments with Vitality and MOUZ.
The power of smaller CS2 teams
Let’s not underestimate the power of small teams. In the current CS2 esports infrastructure, players from these organizations can grow into big celebrities in top teams.
As an example, B8 shone at BLAST.tv Austin Major 2025. The team advanced to Stage 2 at that event and managed to defeat Team Falcons before getting eliminated.
Overlapping tournaments
The community talked about this issue when the CS2 esports calendar for 2025 was formed at the start of the season. With so many tournaments in the schedule, it’s no wonder big teams decide to skip some — even if the prize pools are as big as $500,000.
For comparison, ESL Pro League Season 22 has $400,000, and the entire CS2 elite is there. BLAST Open Fall 2025 had $330,000.
The situation went as far as having two half-million tournaments at the same time. Somehow, teams such as The MongolZ, G2, and Falcons went for FISSURE Playground #2. NAVI chose StarLadder StarSeries Fall 2025.
StarLadder returns to the CS2 esports scene with a much bigger event than their StarSeries. From Nov. 24 to Dec. 07, we can witness StarLadder Budapest Major 2025. Everyone in the pro community will be there!
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