The first evening of the MLG Americas Minor Championship has come to a close, with Enemy and Leader-1 scoring important Group B wins whereas SPLYCE sent EZG home in the Group B losers match (16-14 on de_cache).

Seven teams converged on the MLG Americas Minor Championship, the first of four regional Valve-endorsed Minors which all dole out $50,000 in prize money and a coveted invitation to the MLG Columbus Major offline qualifier taking place February 26-28.

Interestingly enough, Group A, which was already a team short due to two Brazilian teams encountering visa issues and compLexity dropping out due to a reforming roster, saw its only match of the day also become a forfeit win for Winterfox as Obey.Alliance's Terry "⁠dsr⁠" Rioux was unable to arrive at the Arena in time due to flight issues.



arya's SPLYCE struggled on the first day of the MLG Americas Minor

Group B however got to see all three of its matches play out in a full-spread and the opening match saw Michael "⁠MAiNLiNE⁠" Jaber lead his Enemy team to a 16-9 win on de_cache over the relatively newfound EZG eSports team, with hotshot Kenneth "⁠koosta⁠" Suen putting in a noteworthy performance.

MLG Americas Minor Championship Best of 1 Enemy Matchpage 16 9 EZG 16 Cache 9

Enemy K - D +/- ADR Rating 1.0 Michael 'MAiNLiNE' JaberMAiNLiNE 29 - 18 +11 - 1.73 Kenneth 'koosta' Suenkoosta 26 - 12 +14 - 1.69 Michael 'Uber' StapellsUber 23 - 14 +9 - 1.43 Skyler 'Relyks' WeaverRelyks 12 - 16 -4 - 0.79 Richard 'Lucky' VasconcelosLucky 11 - 18 -7 - 0.67 EZG K - D +/- ADR Rating 1.0 Thomas 'GrumpiX' JungGrumpiX 18 - 19 -1 - 0.94 Paul 'MORViD' BeamMORViD 19 - 21 -2 - 0.88 Adrian 'recky' Golecrecky 15 - 20 -5 - 0.78 Igor 'cuse' Nikoliccuse 13 - 20 -7 - 0.69 Nick 'N4j' NormanN4j 13 - 21 -8 - 0.66

The second opening match of Group B was something of a thriller as Arya "⁠arya⁠" Hekmat's SPLYCE team paired up against Leader-1, an up-and-coming team from ESEA Premier.

After a close 8-7 first half on de_dust2, it was Leader-1 who pulled ahead to snatch the map away with a 16-14 scoreline, with Daniel "⁠virtus⁠" Carrillo putting in a massive performance that included garnering 24 AWP kills in the game.

A note of controversy emerged from this match as it was mistakenly found out that the server had been using the old 1:45/0:35 times, rather than the new 1:55/0:40 format recently enforced by Valve.

MLG Americas Minor Championship Best of 1 Splyce Matchpage 14 16 Leader-1 14 Dust2 16

Leader-1 K - D +/- ADR Rating 1.0 Daniel 'virtus' Carrillovirtus 35 - 20 +15 - 1.58 Corey 'flashstep' Parksflashstep 22 - 23 -1 - 1.02 Josh 'joshbM' BlierjoshbM 18 - 24 -6 - 0.82 Tyler 'Char' WallaceChar 13 - 22 -9 - 0.64 Jason 'focs' Maueryfocs 12 - 26 -14 - 0.46 Splyce K - D +/- ADR Rating 1.0 Arya 'arya' Hekmatarya 30 - 20 +10 - 1.36 David 'DAVEY' StaffordDAVEY 25 - 20 +5 - 1.24 Andrew 'Professor_Chaos' HeintzProfessor_Chaos 22 - 20 +2 - 1.08 Jason 'jasonR' RuchelskijasonR 21 - 19 +2 - 1.04 Abraham 'abE' FazliabE 17 - 21 -4 - 0.80

The final match of the day came far too close for comfort for David "⁠DAVEY⁠" Stafford & co. of SPLYCE as following a dominant 11-4 T-half on de_cache, EZG (who are a team currently competing in ESEA Intermediate) nearly managed to knock SPLYCE out of the tournament.

With 15-year-old Paul "⁠MORViD⁠" Beam of EZG wreaking havoc on the server, the match reached 14-14, however SPLYCE finally pulled away and survived to fight another day by winning 16-14.

MLG Americas Minor Championship Best of 1 EZG Matchpage 14 16 Splyce 14 Cache 16

Splyce K - D +/- ADR Rating 1.0 Andrew 'Professor_Chaos' HeintzProfessor_Chaos 18 - 12 +6 - 1.11 David 'DAVEY' StaffordDAVEY 26 - 22 +4 - 1.10 Jason 'jasonR' RuchelskijasonR 23 - 21 +2 - 1.08 Arya 'arya' Hekmatarya 22 - 21 +1 - 0.99 Abraham 'abE' FazliabE 18 - 24 -6 - 0.72 EZG K - D +/- ADR Rating 1.0 Paul 'MORViD' BeamMORViD 29 - 19 +10 - 1.34 Adrian 'recky' Golecrecky 22 - 20 +2 - 1.04 Thomas 'GrumpiX' JungGrumpiX 14 - 19 -5 - 0.75 Igor 'cuse' Nikoliccuse 20 - 26 -6 - 0.74 Nick 'N4j' NormanN4j 15 - 23 -8 - 0.69

Tomorrow's action will see the best-of-one winners matches of both groups kick off first at the event, with Enemy taking on Leader-1 and Winterfox going against OpTic who will finally enter the action at the Americas Minor.

SPLYCE and Obey.Alliance (the latter team will have dsr in attendance by tomorrow) meanwhile await the losers of these games in the best-of-three decider matches.

The action can of course be watched over at twitch.tv/mlg and MLG.tv.

stich writes for HLTV.org and can be found on Twitter