CLG are the second North American team to make it to playoffs at the first North American major following a 2-1 victory over Gambit (de_cache 13-16, de_cbble 16-11, de_mirage 16-10).

Group C's decider saw CLG and Gambit start on the latter's pick, Cache, where the CIS-based squad won the pistol by an A split. After surviving the following anti-forcebuy, they fell to a nearly clean eco however, before Dmitry "⁠hooch⁠" Bogdanov clutched a 1-on-3 to claw it to 3-1.

The next four rounds went CLG's way, starting with a forcebuy victory, as well as good movement from Tarik "⁠tarik⁠" Celik in one of the gunrounds. hooch then stepped up to the plate again with a triple in a blink of an eye, which set off a streak of their own.

Rustem "⁠mou⁠" Telepov piled on with an AWP triple and a quad in two of the remaining six gunrounds, and ended up on 21 kills before the half ended at 10-5 in his team's favor.

Dauren "⁠AdreN⁠" Kystaubayev's heroics which saw him taking an ace weren't enough, as he couldn't defuse the bomb in time, but a forcebuy win in the following round made up for it, and Gambit looked to be favored to win at 13-6.



mou, AdreN and hooch all had moments of brilliance on Cache

CLG started clawing back in however, as they traded one round for six quite comfortably, but they threw it all away once they didn't give themselves enough time to plant the bomb, allowing Gambit to get match point. After just two rounds Gambit finished map one off at 16-13.

After switching over to CLG's pick, Cobblestone, the Americans got off to a flying 7-0 start much thanks to Josh "⁠jdm64⁠" Marzano who clutched a 1-on-2 situation in the first gunround and got a couple of doubles in two others.

Jan "⁠wayLander⁠" Rahkonen helped put Gambit on the board with two doubles in a row for 3-7, but jdm64's triple gave CLG three rounds in a row before the last two remaining were split evenly, as CLG switched over with 11-4.

For a while it looked like Gambit would be able to come back, as wayLander showed up for his team, who clawed back to only a two-round difference. However, once CLG picked up their first round as Terrorists, there no stopping them until match point.

AdreN's triple and a convincing defence set the score to 15-11, but it wasn't enough to come back fully as CLG closed it out at 16-11, 1-1.



CLG drove through Gambit with jdm64 behind the wheel on Cobble

The deciding map was set to be Mirage, where CLG once again got off to a great start after winning the pistol round. After wayLander got a triple to put up Gambit's first round on the board, the American squad reset Gambit's economy in their own eco round and continued to thrive for 6-1.

A last-second plant with tarik saving a scary anti-eco and a quad by jdm64 pushed the score to 8-1 before Gambit started to find ways to win more rounds. After 9-2 it was all them as they switched over with six rounds as Counter-Terrorists.

A one-sided pistol round going in favor of CLG meant they'd get up to 12-6 after a couple of anti-ecos. That was soon extended to 14-6 when tarik and jdm64 were the stars of the following two rounds. When AdreN's triple saved his team from match point, CLG replied instantly with a 3-on-4 clutch at the hands of tarik and Stephen "⁠reltuC⁠" Cutler. It took them three more rounds to close it out, as Gambit overturned a 2-on-4 situation, but at 16-10 CLG secured a place in the quarter-finals, where they will meet Liquid.

MLG Columbus 2016 Best of 3 Gambit Matchpage 1 2 CLG 16 Cache 13 11 Cobblestone 16 10 Mirage 16

Gambit K - D +/- ADR Rating 2.0 Mihail 'Dosia' StolyarovDosia 52 - 57 -5 87.6 1.10 Dauren 'AdreN' KystaubayevAdreN 61 - 57 +4 79.3 1.05 Dmitry 'hooch' Bogdanovhooch 55 - 58 -3 78.2 1.01 Rustem 'mou' Telepovmou 53 - 60 -7 59.7 0.93 Jan 'wayLander' RahkonenwayLander 50 - 63 -13 65.2 0.80 CLG K - D +/- ADR Rating 2.0 Josh 'jdm64' Marzanojdm64 76 - 52 +24 90.5 1.42 James 'hazed' Cobbhazed 65 - 56 +9 91.1 1.19 Tarik 'tarik' Celiktarik 64 - 54 +10 82.1 1.16 Stephen 'reltuC' CutlerreltuC 45 - 54 -9 64.9 0.88 Jacob 'FugLy' MedinaFugLy 44 - 55 -11 57.9 0.82

Only one quarter-final name remains to be found as Virtus.pro and G2 are heading into the last decider, in group D.