Another draw at EPICENTER as NiP win Nuke 16-11 and Na'Vi win Overpass 16-3. Round difference means Na`Vi goes to semifinals. NiP are out.

With yet another tie between G2 and Dignitas earlier today, both Natus Vincere and NiP had all to win and lose at the same time as either team could take the number one spot in the group and also end up going out last place.

First up on Nuke it was the ninjas that got their CT-pistol, but only just as Aleksandr "⁠s1mple⁠" Kostyliev 1v3 almost pulled off a ridiculous line up of all the CT's in vents with a Glock. Due to back to back bomb plants and keeping the CT survivors low the CIS team applied the pressure early on to get a crucial T round, but the Swedes counter-reset them straight away to secure a 6-1 lead.

In a chaotic round echoing the spirits of match making where Natus Vincere in a 3v5 got a bomb plant on lower and had CT's practically walk into their crosshairs, it came down to Mikail "⁠Maikelele⁠" Bill almost pulling off a ninja defuse by being just a tick short of it. It spurred on Ioann "⁠Edward⁠" Sukhariev and co. to make it back to a single round deficit with 5-6.

Christopher "⁠GeT_RiGhT⁠" Alesund and his team took the lead again and barely avoided reset thanks to the aforementioned player, as he this time lived up to the namesake of the team, defusing in a smoke. 9-6 in favor of the ninjas going into halftime.

Natus Vincere took the obligatory three rounds off the back of their CT-pistol plus an extra thus taking the lead for the first time 10-9, but the Swedish began to consistently overwhelm the bombsites early, as there was not being much aggression put on from Denis "⁠seized⁠" Kostin and his squad.

They had a chance to pull back in the 23rd round, but botching their man advantage in a 4v3, impatiently pushing out from vents on to B-site and the Swedes had the map on a silver platter closing it out 16-11.

Backs against the wall on Overpass the Black-Yellow barely got their T-pistol with a last second plant followed by two more anti-ecos and hard-resetting the Swedes right after the first gun round, thus comfortably getting to a 8-1 lead by blasting through to CT-defense time and time again.



Edward lead the charge on Overpass

Off the back of a tactical pause Adam "⁠friberg⁠" Friberg and his team posted a round on the board, himself getting a quad-kill, but all for naught as they were once again hard-reset by a solid gameplan from seized and co. 13-2 for Natus Vincere going into the second half.

A crucial pistol round win with Richard "⁠Xizt⁠" Landström stepping massively up with a triple kill was a light in the darkness, but quickly turned off by the CIS machine as they caught the ninjas with their pyjamas down on the obvious force buy and Egor "⁠flamie⁠" Vasilyev clutched it out the 1v1 against GeT_RiGhT blowing out the map 16-3.

This result means that Natus Vincere take the top spot and move directly to the semi-finals on sunday. G2 will face off against the third seed from group B and Dignitas will take on the second seed.



Group A Score RD Natus Vincere 3-3 7 G2 3-3 2 Dignitas 3-3 1 NiP 3-3 -10

Last match of the group stage will be Virtus.pro against fnatic determining the final standings and seeds.

