Is it still not the start of the NAVI Era?
It was the perfect Grand Finals fans wanted to see. NAVI and Team Vitality faced off against each other in the Grand Finals of the BLAST Premier Fall Finals. S1mple and zyw0o would go up against each other in a battle (one more) for the best team in the world.
NAVI has just won the PGL Stockholm Major, no surprises there. But fans would have loved to see a Vitality vs NAVI grand finals. They got their desired matchup in the BLAST Premier fall Finals Grand finals.
And NAVI won. The CIS squad defeated Vitality 2-1 to win the tournament and pocket $225,000 in prize money. This was their fourth consecutive victory on LAN (including IEM Katowice 2020, which was the last LAN event before the pandemic).
Vitality surprise NAVI with a Nuke
NAVI is one of the best teams on Nuke. The team has ramped up 20 consecutive victories on this map and is a powerhouse to say the least. So when NAVI won Mirage and Nike was the second map, many assumed it was going to be a 2-0 score. It wasn’t.
Vitality pulled out their best weapons from the arsenal and nuked NAVI. The 16-6 victory scoreline fails to do justice to the dominance by the Frenchmen on this map. On each map, S1mple (for NAVI) and Zyw0o (for Vitality) had the most frags on their respective teams.
On the third map of Dust 2, electronic pulled off some amazing headshots and positional plays to hand NAVI the tournament victory.
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Is this the start of the NAVI era?
Don’t get me wrong. NAVI has been winning many tournaments both online and offline for the past few months.
Over the past few months, NAVI has won the DreamHack Masters Spring 2021, came 2nd at the BLAST Spring Finals. They started their win streak with the StarLadder CIS RMR 2021 where they defeated Gambit in a close Bo5 series. This victory was followed by wins at IEM Cologne 2021, ESL Pro League Season 14 as well as topping their BLAST Premier Fall Groups. With the EPL 14 win, NAVI also won the Intel Grand Slam with a massive million-dollar prize pool.
But the goal never shifted. NAVI is one of the most well-known organizations in CS:GO. The team has been a part of the game since its early years and has consistently been near the top of the scene. With a few grand final appearances and an appearance at every CS:GO Major ( no minor feat) it was actually surprising to see NAVI without a CS:GO Major in its trophy cabinet.
Maybe 2021 was the year. With players like S1mple, B1t and electronic on the roster, this current iteration looks ripe to kickstart an era. A CIS era. And they did. NAVI cruised through the PGL Stockholm Major but their coach stopped short of calling this the NAVI era.
People I think will realize when it starts. I think we can do even more to say that we started an era.
S1mple is still not calling it the start of the NAVI era, although we might be very close.
What are the BLAST Premier Fall Finals Results?
With this victory, NAVI won $225,000 as well as a guaranteed spot at the upcoming BLAST Premier World Finals.
- Natus Vincere: $225,000
- Team Vitality:$85,000
- Astralis:$45,000
- Heroic:$25,000
- FaZe Clan/Team Liquid: $15,000
- BIG/NiP: $10,000
With the BLAST Premier Fall Finals victory, NAVI is further cementing its place as the best CS: GO team in 2021. But there are still a few more tournaments to go. The CS: GO esports circuit will now move on to IEM Winter where some of the best teams will be in action.
Stay tuned to esports.gg for the latest CS:GO news and updates.
