The Brazilian side Tempo Storm and Joshua "steel" Nissan's Torqued have finished top two in the North American IEM Oakland 2017 open qualifier, earning a spot in the next stage.

A total of 58 teams from the region competed in the open qualifier for IEM Oakland 2017, with the matches all the way up to the semi-final being BO1. In that first part of the qualifier, Rogue, debuting with Casper "⁠cadiaN⁠" Møller, lost out to Tempo Storm, while Splyce and Complexity were surprised and eliminated by Gale Force and SoaR, respectively.

With the two best teams from the bracket moving on to the closed qualifier, the semi-final match was the deciding one for four teams: Tempo Storm, Rise Nation, Gale Force and Torqued.

steel's Torqued will move on to the IEM Oakland closed qualifier

Tempo Storm faced Rise Nation, who are bound to attend the ESEA S25 Global Challenge this weekend. The Brazilian side took control of the match early on, finishing the Terrorist side of Rise Nation's map pick, Inferno, 12-3 up. Will "⁠dazzLe⁠" Loafman's 32-kill display got his team back into the game in the second half, but Tempo Storm was able to close it out 16-13 in the end.

The start was similar on the second map, with Paulo "⁠land1n⁠" Felipe and co. starting Overpass with a 7-0 lead on the CT side. Jonathan "⁠Jonji⁠" Carey's team did put up a fight, taking the lead before the end of the half with eight consecutive rounds of their own, but were again completely blown out on the CT side. Tempo Storm closed out the second map 16-9 and overall, Lucas "⁠DeStiNy⁠" Bullo had a great series, finishing with a 1.43 rating and 99.4 ADR.

IEM Oakland 2017 North America Open Qualifier Best of 3 Tempo Storm Matchpage 2 0 Rise Nation 16 Inferno 13 16 Overpass 9

Tempo Storm K - D +/- ADR Rating 2.0 Lucas 'DeStiNy' BulloDeStiNy 48 - 35 +13 99.4 1.43 Alef 'tatazin' Pereiratatazin 37 - 29 +8 74.5 1.17 Paulo 'land1n' Felipeland1n 39 - 29 +10 69.6 1.15 Bruno 'shz' Martinellishz 38 - 34 +4 82.7 1.12 Denis 'dzt' Fischerdzt 33 - 39 -6 60.8 0.98 Rise Nation K - D +/- ADR Rating 2.0 Will 'dazzLe' LoafmandazzLe 45 - 43 +2 96.8 1.18 Jonathan 'Jonji' CareyJonji 30 - 40 -10 74.8 0.94 Kaleb 'moose' Jaynemoose 35 - 43 -8 70.9 0.90 Brandon 'Ace' WinnAce 27 - 34 -7 48.9 0.86 Andy 'vSa' XuvSa 29 - 35 -6 57.6 0.83

The second match, between Gale Force and Torqued, started with Overpass. The Argentinian side played well on their map pick, finishing the CT half with a slight, 8-7 advantage, before taking over control of the game after the switch to win the map 16-8.

A back-and-forth affair on Inferno could've gone either way, but, despite Guillermo "⁠guishorro⁠" Areco's heroics (31 kills and a 1.56 rating), Torqued were the ones to take the second map, securing the last two rounds after Gale Force tied the score at 14-14. The decider, Train, was all about Joshua "⁠steel⁠" Nissan, who got the most first kills (5), opening up the rounds for his team to go 10-5 up as Terrorists, but also topped the scoreboard in terms of most kills and total damage. Torqued secured the third map 16-9, clinching a top two spot and a place in the closed qualifier.

IEM Oakland 2017 North America Open Qualifier Best of 3 Gale Force Matchpage 1 2 Torqued 16 Overpass 8 14 Inferno 16 9 Train 16

Gale Force K - D +/- ADR Rating 2.0 Guillermo 'guishorro' Arecoguishorro 59 - 55 +4 82.2 1.14 Edgar 'MarKE' MaldonadoMarKE 57 - 52 +5 76.8 1.09 Jonathan 'JonY BoY' MuñozJonY BoY 52 - 52 0 76.1 1.02 Tomás 'tomi' Guardiatomi 50 - 57 -7 68.6 0.91 Matias 'tutehen' Canaletutehen 35 - 57 -22 56.1 0.74 Torqued K - D +/- ADR Rating 2.0 Joshua 'steel' Nissansteel 68 - 50 +18 87.4 1.31 Sam '4sh0t' Mariano4sh0t 51 - 52 -1 71.4 1.08 Trey 'tck' Martintck 57 - 51 +6 72.8 1.08 Armeen 'a2z' Toussia2z 55 - 53 +2 75.6 1.05 Neil 'montE' MontgomerymontE 40 - 47 -7 64.9 0.95

For now, only these two teams are confirmed for the IEM Oakland North America closed qualifier, with six more to be invited to play out the single-elimination BO3 bracket for a spot at the LAN: