One step closer, C9 now just two match wins away from Iceland invite.
One of the best teams in North America, Cloud9 survived the elimination scare against Version 1. The series went the distance with Version 1 surprising Cloud9 on Breeze, a loss that C9 Mitch claims was just unlucky.
The lower bracket match between Cloud9 and Version 1 was a chaotic one, full of ups and downs and everything in between. It all started off with Version 1 surprising C9 on Breeze.
Clutches galore for Cloud9
The first map of Breeze saw both teams put together a string of rounds. Version1 won the first six rounds followed by six for Cloud9. The second half started with Cloud9 winning the pistol and the next two rounds. But Version1 managed to string together seven of the next eight rounds to claim victory.
But Cloud9, the favorites to win the series, took the next two maps. Ascent was very close and the map could have gone to overtime were it not for a beautiful clutch by C9 Xeta.
Suddenly left in a 1v3, Xeta timed his Hunter’s Fury to perfection, forcing the Version1 player off the spike defuse. Xeta did not miss his shots when it mattered the most, clutching the 2nd map for C9.
“I feel like we just came out on top of the chaos (of pistol round wins). Both teams are pretty bad at pistol rounds statistically”
It also helped that Cloud9 won 5 pistol rounds in today’s series. We came out on top of the chaos, says Mitch in the post-game interview.
Cloud9 Mitch: “We played our own game plan and executed pretty well.”
In the post-match interview, C9 Mitch praised the team’s coaching duo, James "JamezIRL" Macaulay and Head coach, Yoon "Autumn" Eu-teum for helping the team.
“We played our own game plan and executed pretty well.”
Autumn and JamezIRL have been an integral part of Cloud9's success. Having helped the players rise to the top of the North American scene, their contribution to the team's success can easily be overlooked. Even though Cloud9 lost a map, Mitch isn't worried. Instead he has nothing but praise for the individual players on Version1, who are extremely talented and can take a map off anybody, he says.
“We did our homework. JamezIRL and Autumn are incredible coaches. They prepare a lot of stuff for us. I think we came in pretty confident. We played our own game plan and executed pretty well.”
Coming into this series, Cloud9 were favored to win 2-0. Version1 has had a few roster changes in recent weeks and even then they were able surprise C9 with a Breeze map win.
“For that match in particular, I feel we got a little bit unlucky in the beginning. The first gun round, Effy’s 1v3 was pretty unlucky. After that I feel we got a good read and all the other rounds were close. So we got a bit unlucky and got to clean up our late-game stuff.”
With this win, Cloud9 will now face XSET in yet another elimination match. They are just two match wins away from securing an invite to VCT Masters Reykjavik.
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