This week will see teams from both North and South America play each other in Toronto, Canada from Nov. 2nd - 5th for a share of the $50,000 prize pool and an all-important spot at the ELEAGUE Boston Main Qualifier in January. We’ve prepared a preview of the 8 attendees heading into the event.

The tournament will utilize the normal format for the Minors, consisting of two four-team GSL groups feeding into a double-elimination playoff bracket.

The participants have been split up into the following two groups:

One of the two invitees, Liquid, is the clear favorite for the event after boasting a large resume of results stronger than some already qualified for the Major itself. Liquid’s previous attempt to qualify for the Main Qualifier was DreamHack Stockholm in 2015, before the Minor circuit was created, meaning that this will be the first Minor for the American players of the team, Nick "⁠nitr0⁠" Cannella, Jonathan "⁠EliGE⁠" Jablonowski, and Josh "⁠jdm64⁠" Marzano. After Liquid however, it is wide open, with no team really standing out from the others.

Ratings used are from the past three months on LAN

* indicates online rating

Offline results in the past three months 7th-8th EPICENTER EPICENTER 13th-16th ELEAGUE Premier ELEAGUE Premier 2nd ESL One New York ESL One New York 2nd ESG Tour Mykonos ESG Tour Mykonos

It would seem odd that a team of Liquid’s caliber has ended up in the Minor of all places, and to see why one must look back to the Offline Qualifier for PGL Krakow 2017, where Liquid lost to FlipSid3 in double overtime in the fifth round of the Swiss group to barely miss the Major. That tournament in particular was a large letdown for the American team as they had been hyped up a lot, but ended up losing to PENTA, BIG, and F3. Granted all three of those teams surprised and qualified for Krakow, but they still should have been beatable for a team with the talent of Liquid.

As said above, this will be the first Minor for nitr0, EliGE, and jdm64, but stanislaw and Twistzz have both been to two each. stanislaw attended the first two Minors with OpTic, winning the second one over Tempo Storm, while Twistzz attended the second and third with TSM, placing just outside the top 2 both times.

Liquid are the clear-cut favourites for the Minor

Liquid seem to finally be capitalizing on their potential after disappointing initially at cs_summit and DreamHack Austin, and only showing mediocre results until ESG Tour Mykonos, where they notably defeated SK in the semi-final and ultimately placed second. The main change in their game that likely resulted in this drastic change in results is the swap of in-game leading to nitr0 from stanislaw.

This role change is quite big, as stanislaw was originally signed as an IGL, but now fulfills a lurk/support role. The most important result of this change was that the form of Twistzz has skyrocketed, and he has not only turned into the second star of the team, but one of the best players in the world.

Despite deceptively poor placings at the ELEAGUE Premier and EPICENTER, Liquid still look for better than any of the teams in attendance here. Ultimately, this Minor is theirs to lose.

Offline results in the past three months 7th-8th DreamHack Denver DreamHack Denver

Since the Americas Minor for PGL Krakow ended, this squad has been very aggressive in their roster moves, first removing Derrick "⁠LILMAN⁠" Boyne and Peter "⁠ptr⁠" Gurney in favor of two European imports in former Singularity player AnJ and the ex-Outlaws player CeRq. Interestingly enough, both of these players are AWPers, but as of now, CeRq is the primary AWP while AnJ is the secondary.

FugLy announced on Twitter that he had been the in-game leader since the beginning of September and that Damian "⁠daps⁠" Steele had moved into an entry-fragging role. This put into question daps’s place on the team, and this question was answered on October 15, when daps moved to a coaching role, being replaced by RIKO from Denial.

CeRq will be out to prove his worth in Toronto

The team attended DreamHack Denver two weeks ago, and it didn’t go great. Without daps in the server, the team was easily dealt with by BIG and LDLC to go out in last place. This Minor will the perfect place for NRG to not only act on their increased talent pool, but also to prove that FugLy is a capable leader, despite their rough start in Colorado.

Offline results in the past three months 7th-8th DreamHack Montreal DreamHack Montreal

The story of this team is a somewhat depressing one, as each iteration of the roster seems to perform the same as the last, and never amounts to more than qualifying for a big LAN every once in a while. Since the last Americas Minor, this team dropped longtime North American veteran Derek "⁠desi⁠" Branchen along with British import Kia "⁠Surreal⁠" Man in favor of youngster yay and former NRG player ptr.

However, the American team has looked decent online, picking up some wins against Renegades, Denial, Rogue, and Gale Force, as well as FRENCH CANADIANS, Tempo Storm, and Rise Nation in this Minor’s qualifier. They have only managed a 7-13 record in EPL despite taking maps from Immortals and Liquid, and they exited last in their only LAN showing in the last three months.

The players to look at are the new additions, ptr and yay, who have been putting up pretty consistent numbers online, but have yet to convert it to LAN. Slemmy and co. should be looking for a playoff berth here at best, but even that will be tough, considering the field.

Offline results in the past three months 5th-6th ESEA Season 25 MDL Global Challenge (3/5 of the current lineup ESEA Season 25 MDL Global Challenge (3/5 of the current lineup

This squad, just a few weeks ago, had a very different roster than the one that qualified for the event in Toronto. Fielding 1.6 legends Rafael "⁠pava⁠" Pavanelli and Bruno "⁠bit⁠" Lima, this team was the best Brazilian team residing in Brazil for the last three months, winning Festival de Games ITX Gamer Cup 2017, Gamers Club Masters 2017, XLG Copa Brasil - Finals, ESEA Open Season 25 Brazil, and Geek City CS:GO 2017. They attended the ESEA S25 Global Challenge and beat Mythic, but still exited the tournament in the group stage.

In the past month, pava decided to step down from the lineup for personal reasons, while bit left to join up with Henrique "⁠HEN1⁠" Teles, Lucas "⁠LUCAS1⁠" Teles, Vito "⁠kNgV-⁠" Giuseppe and Lincoln "⁠fnx⁠" Lau. The two players to watch out for from this squad are trk and iDk, who have been putting in work for the Brazilian squad and have been praised by pava, who expects them to grow as time goes on.

Group B

Offline results in the past three months 5th-6th DreamHack Denver DreamHack Denver 3rd-4th DreamHack Montreal DreamHack Montreal

This team has been relatively inactive for the last three months, only attending two smaller LANs, DreamHack Montreal and DreamHack Denver. In Montreal, they easily took down Gale Force and Kinguin to make the playoffs, but fell to Immortals in the semi-finals. In Denver, they could only take down Tempo Storm, and fell to Renegades in the Group A decider.

Their last big LAN placing was at DreamHack Summer, where they beat Gambit and fnatic in the group stage and took a map off of SK in the playoffs, but that was quite a while ago at this point. In the online leagues, they have been performing fairly well, sitting on a 14-8 record in EPL and on a 5-7 record so far in ECS.

FNS & co are expected to reach the playoffs

Presumably the team, and in particular FNS, has been working with their new coach, Steve "⁠Ryu⁠" Rattacasa, to create new tactics and to better counter-strat their opponents. CLG have proved that they have good star players in koosta, Ethan, and Rickeh, but it’s a matter of getting them to show up more frequently and together, especially since the departure of coach Chet "ImAPet" Singh. The supportive base of reltuC and FNS has actually been quite impressive in recent times, so the big question surrounding this squad going into the Minor is if FNS and Ryu can activate their stars at the right times

Offline results in the past three months 5th-6th DreamHack Montreal DreamHack Montreal

The core of this team can be traced back to WinOut in mid 2016, and has resided in the States for over a year at this point. They’ve made significant progress from their beginnings, qualifying for both ESL Pro League and ECS North America.

AWPer yel and ex-Immortals veteran SHOOWTiME are the main stars of the team, with direction from in-game leader PKL. The team, however, had leveled off, and after the previous Minor (which saw compatriots paiN beat a standin-filled Misfits), Luminosity decided that a drastic roster move was necessary to advance their position in the NA region.

Luminosity's recent online form has been good, but will they show up in Toronto?

So far, the additions of NEKIZ and chelo haven’t propelled Luminosity to new heights like they would have hoped. At their single LAN appearance in DreamHack Montreal, they managed to beat Complexity, but fell to Cloud9 and Immortals, exiting in the group stage. They have played well in EPL so far, with a 11-9 record, and in ECS they are currently 6-4. This upcoming Minor will be a critical time for PKL and coach Alessandro "Apoka" Marcucci to show that the removal of Lucas "⁠DeStiNy⁠" Bullo and Bruno "⁠shz⁠" Martinelli was the correct choice.

Misfits made their way to this Americas Minor through the Last Chance Qualifier, which was created after FRENCH CANADIANS announced that they would not attend due to concerns with their player Mert "⁠REOVA⁠" Bayrak and his status in the United States. seang@res’s team took down both Immortals and SoaR in consecutive BO3s to secure their spot at the Minor.

The team in general has been in quite poor form, however, in the last months, falling in online qualifiers to teams like Rise Nation, Luminosity, OpTic, and NRG, many of whom will be at this event. In their sole online league (due to failing to qualify for ECS), they sit at a decent 10-8, taking a map off SK, but losing 0-2 to Renegades.

The Minor will be a good place for Misfits to turn their fortunes around

The main players to look for are obviously ShahZaM, SicK, and AmaNEk, but they haven’t been very consistent at all recently. The future looks bleak for this squad, but if seang@res wants to turn the Misfits ship around, this Minor would be a great place to begin, especially with many of the teams they have recently lost to in attendance.

Offline results in the past three months 3rd-4th ESEA Season 25 MDL Global Challenge ESEA Season 25 MDL Global Challenge

This majority Canadian team has rocketed through the ranks in recent months, with many impressive runs in qualifiers and a win in ESEA Premier Season 25, taking down the likes of NRG, CLG, and Misfits during their campaign. Their two LAN appearances have been at Fragadelphia 11, where they placed second to Braxton "⁠swag⁠" Pierce’s ownage mix, and at the ESEA Season 25 Global Challenge, where they placed 3rd-4th, losing to Space Soldiers in the semi-finals.

The team has been less dominant in this season of MDL, dropping maps to Naventic, GX, and CheckSix already, but should still be expected to place in the top 8 at the end of the season. The players to watch out for on this squad will be moose and dazzLe, two riflers who have been their main performers in the big games.