Finally! After five days of fierce competition, ICE Challenge 2020 has come to a close, with Mousesports defeating Natus Vincere 3-1 in the Grand Final to acquire their fourth championship victory from their last five LAN events!

With this conquest, Mousesports has received $125,000 in prize money and perfect momentum for IEM Katowice 2020, starting on February 25th 2020! Map one of the Bo5 Grand Final began on Dust 2, (the first map pick of Mousesports) although you wouldn’t have known that, given their underwhelming CT-side performance where they only managed to secure 5 rounds. However, once they switched over to the T-side, Mousesports definitely looked back with their best, especially ”ropz” whose hard carry performance of 30 kills gave his team a tight 16-14 victory!

Photo via HLTV

Now Natus Vincere were hoping to tie up the series on their own map pick of Inferno. However, Mousesports were quick out of the blocks, taking the first five rounds, with Navi’s defence unable to contain the overwhelming onslaught of Mousesports. Half time ultimately ended with the score at 9-6. The CT defence of Mousesports was equally strong, with Natus Vincere only managing to secure to two rounds on the T-side of Inferno. This means that Mousesports was swiftly able to finish the map with the final score ending 16-8, leaving Mousesports just one map away from winning the whole tournament!

Now on match and championship point, Mousesports returned to their second map pick of the grand final, Train. Surprisingly though, Navi rushed ahead, winning the first five rounds if the map, looking to be in complete control. That was until Round 7, when ”ChrisJ” pulled off the play of year, (so far). Hell, the play of the decade, winning an impossible 1v5 scenario, getting all headshots with the AK-47! You can check out the incredible ACE from ”ChrisJ” below with the frag movie made by HLTV!

Thankfully for Natus Vincere, they were able to recover from the mistakes made in the ”ChrisJ” round, to form a very respectable 9-6 halftime score. However, this was the map where “s1mple” finally came alive, almost singlehandedly winning the map by himself, clutching crucial rounds on multiple occasions, ending train with 30 kills and with Navi taking the map 16-11.

Photo via HLTV

The final map of the tournament would be Nuke. This was the second map pick of Natus Vincere. Mousesports started off on the favoured CT side and their defence provided them with an encouraging 10-5 advantage. However, Navi was able to obtain the following pistol round and counter the force buy from Mousesports to close the distance. That was until Mousesports stormed back into the game, taking the next four rounds to have the score at 14-7. Much like Dust 2, the defence of Navi was unable to contain the attacks of Mousesports, with ”Karrigan” and his men closing out the final map 16-9 to become champions of ICE Challenge 2020!

Mousesports is currently ranked 2nd in the HLTV ratings and I fully expect them to say there after this terrific performance. Since Mouse wasn’t invited to the BLAST London events, we’ll next see them in a few weeks time at IEM Katowice 2020. If they can continue this form going into Poland, I could well see them taking the whole event by storm!

The (HLTV) MVP of ICE Challenge 2020 was ‘‘electronic”, picking up the first MVP of his career! His fantastic display in the Grand Final was the particular highlight ending with a positive KD of +20 and an ADR of 101.2! Sadly, it wasn’t enough, as Mousesports proved too strong in the end. Unfortunately for Natus Vincere, they literally have to play a Bo3 against Team Vitality in less than 24 hours in Group B of the BLAST Premier: Spring 2020 Regular Season 7, starting February 6th 2020 16:30 CEST.

WATCH: twitch.tv/blastpremier

Photo via HLTV

In Conclusion:

Coming up in the Counter-Strike scene we have DreamHack Open Anaheim 2020 beginning February 21st 2020.

We’ll next see Mousesports at IEM Katowice 2020 starting Feburary 25th 2020.

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