Apeks, Into the Breach and FaZe Clan won their do-or-die matches Tuesday to become the final three teams to advance to the Champions Stage at the BLAST.tv Paris Major 2023 in France.
FaZe rallied from a map down to defeat Natus Vincere, ITB did the same to Fnatic and Apeks swept Ninjas in Pyjamas in Round 5, the final day of the Legends Stage.
Champions Stage action begins Thursday.
Apeks needed overtime to dispatch NiP 19-17 on Vertigo and 19-16 on Ancient. Norway’s Joakim “jkaem” Myrbostad led Apeks with 64 kills and a plus-13 kills-to-deaths differential.
Into the Breach lost the opening map to Fnatic, 16-12 on Inferno. However, ITB rebounded to win 16-8 on Overpass and 16-4 on Vertigo. Joey “CRUC1AL” Steusel of the Netherlands paced ITB with 58 kills and a plus-23 K-D differential.
Likewise, FaZe found themselves in major battle after dropping the first map — Overpass — to Natus Vincere, 16-13. FaZe responded with a 16-5 win on Mirage before taking Anubis in overtime, 22-19. Latvia’s Helvijs “broky” Saukants powered FaZe with 78 kills on a plus-28 differential.
The $1.25 million BLAST.tv Paris Major runs May 8-21, with 24 teams playing offline in Paris. The champion will earn not only a $500,000 payday and 3,500 BLAST Premier points, but also automatic qualification into both IEM Cologne 2023 and the BLAST Premier World Final.
The Challengers and Legends Stages used the Swiss System format, in which teams are divided after opening-match results into “high” and “low” matches. Elimination and advancement matches were best-of-three, and all other matches were best-of-one. The top eight teams in the Legends Stage advanced; the bottom eight were eliminated.
The Champions Stage will be a single-elimination bracket with all matches best-of-three. The final is scheduled for Sunday.
The Champions Stage begins Thursday with two matches:
–Heroic vs. FaZe Clan
–Into The Breach vs. Team Vitality
BLAST.tv Paris Major 2023 standings, prize pool, BLAST Premier points
1. $500,000, 3,500 points, IEM Cologne and BLAST Premier World Final
2. $170,000, 2,750 points
3-4. $80,000, 1,775 points
5-8. $45,000, 1,050 points
9-11. $20,000, no points — Natus Vincere, Fnatic, Ninjas in Pyjamas
12-14. $20,000, no points — ENCE, Bad News Eagles, G2 Esports
15-16. $20,000, no points — 9INE, FURIA Esports
17-19. $10,000, no points — FORZE Esports, Grayhound Gaming, paiN Gaming
20-22. $10,000, no points — Complexity Gaming, The MongolZ, OG
23-24. $10,000, no points — MOUZ, Fluxo
–Field Level Media