Team Vitality swept Heroic 2-0 in Sunday’s grand final to claim the title at the Intel Extreme Masters Rio event in Rio de Janeiro.
Vitality earned the $100,000 first prize and qualification to the $1 million Intel Extreme Masters Cologne scheduled for July 25-Aug. 6 in Germany. As runner-up, Heroic received a $42,000 second prize.
Vitality and Heroic each qualified for the playoffs by finishing in third place in their respective groups in the prior stage. They got hot at the right time, taking down higher-seeded opponents to charge through the quarterfinals and semifinals and reach Sunday’s best-of-three grand final.
But on Sunday, Team Vitality pulled out close wins when it mattered most, taking a 16-13 result on Vertigo before clinching with a 16-12 win on Inferno.
Emil “Magisk” Reif of Denmark posted match highs of 44 kills and a plus-9 kills-to-deaths differential for Vitality. All five Vitality players finished in the green, with Denmark’s Peter “dupreeh” Rasmussen going for 39 kills and a plus-8 and French star Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut adding 38 kills and a plus-7.
Casper “cadiaN” Moller of Denmark recorded 40 kills and a plus-4 for Heroic, the team’s only player with a positive K-D on Sunday.
The $250,000 Counter-Strike: Global Offensive tournament began with 16 teams divided into two groups for the double-elimination opening phase. Each team’s first match consisted of a single map, while all other matches were best-of-three.
The group winners (Natus Vincere and Cloud9) qualified directly for the playoff semifinals. The group runners-up (BIG and FURIA Esports) moved into the playoff quarterfinals as high seeds, and the third-place finishers in each group (Heroic and Team Vitality) started the quarterfinals as low seeds.
Vitality beat BIG 2-0 in the quarterfinals and Cloud9 2-1 in the semifinals before finishing off Heroic for the title.
Intel Extreme Masters Rio prize pool
1. $100,000, berth in IEM Cologne — Team Vitality
2. $42,000 — Heroic
3-4. $20,000 — Natus Vincere, Cloud9
5-6. $10,000 — FURIA Esports, BIG
7-8. $6,000 — Ninjas in Pyjamas, OG
9-12. $5,000 — 9INE, The MongolZ, Fnatic, FaZe Clan
13-16. $4,000 — MOUZ, Imperial Esports, 9z Team, MIBR
–Field Level Media