SK 2-0 Astralis, to the finals of IEM

20-11-2016 21:41

SK Gaming defeated Astralis 2-0 (16-14 on Train, 16-12 on Mirage)at IEM Oakland to secure a spot in the grand final.

SK's fortress, Train, was picked by the Brazilians as the first map of their semi-final match against Astralis, with the Danes getting the CT side start. It wasn't an ideal start Lukas "⁠gla1ve⁠" Rossander's team was looking for though, as SK swiftly got to a 5-0 lead.

Astralis got on the board in round 6, as Markus "⁠Kjaerbye⁠" Kjærbye and Nicolai "⁠device⁠" Reedtz both picked up doubles to stop the B site push. gla1ve picked up two of his own in the following one, starting an eight round winning streak for his team.

8-5 down, SK finally broke their opposition's A site defense after Epitacio "⁠TACO⁠" de Melo punished Peter "⁠dupreeh⁠" Rasmussen's pop dog aggression, allowing them to finish the half 8-7.

FalleN's squad continues with their Train dominance

A pistol round win and two clean anti-eco's put Astralis in a good situation money-wise at the start of the second half, with the gun round win boosting them even further as they found themselves 13-7 up.

At 14-9 and with limited money for his team, Gabriel "⁠FalleN⁠" Toledo picked up three kills with the m4a1-s to secure a crucial round. That small break was enough for SK to get back in the match, as Fernando "⁠fer⁠" Alvarenga continued with his monstrous performance—getting 31 kills as his team completed the 16-14 comeback.

Moving on to Mirage, Astralis were down 4-0 before Andreas "⁠Xyp9x⁠" Højsleth and gla1ve clutched a 2v4 on A to kick-start the Danes on the second map. The score was tied 4-4 when SK decided to change the pace, pushing mid at the start of the round to shut down Astralis early instead of waiting for them to come to the sites.

It was all SK from that point onwards, as Lincoln "⁠fnx⁠" Lau and co. closed the half 11-4, with the whole team chiming in for the Brazilians.

device didn't have a star performance his team needed to overcome SK

Astralis' B site defense was overwhelmed on the pistol round, but Xyp9x and dupreeh locked it up with the second round force buy, starting a series of rounds that were traded back and forward.

The Danes came one round away from tieing it up, but SK managed to overcome them in the end, focusing on the A site and exploiting a weak game from Astralis' start player device. To close it out, TACO clutched another 1v2, making it 16-12 on Mirage.

IEM Oakland 2016Best of 3

Astralis

Matchpage

20th November 2016

Train

Mirage

SK	K - D	+/-	ADR	KAST	Rating2.0
Fernando 'fer' Alvarenga fer	53 - 36	+17	95.5	75.9%	1.43
Gabriel 'FalleN' Toledo FalleN	46 - 34	+12	78.9	67.2%	1.18
Marcelo 'coldzera' David coldzera	41 - 29	+12	63.8	72.4%	1.08
Epitacio 'TACO' de Melo TACO	33 - 32	+1	74.5	67.2%	1.07
Lincoln 'fnx' Lau fnx	26 - 39	-13	65.0	74.1%	0.86

Astralis	K - D	+/-	ADR	KAST	Rating2.0
Peter 'dupreeh' Rasmussen dupreeh	35 - 41	-6	80.4	63.8%	1.02
Markus 'Kjaerbye' Kjærbye Kjaerbye	41 - 41	0	78.7	60.3%	1.00
Lukas 'gla1ve' Rossander gla1ve	35 - 35	0	56.9	60.3%	0.89
Andreas 'Xyp9x' Højsleth Xyp9x	33 - 41	-8	69.7	58.6%	0.86
Nicolai 'device' Reedtz device	26 - 42	-16	54.2	58.6%	0.72

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

very strong game from SK but i aren't think they will win tournament.. astralis just choke sometimes so thats why they lost this time.. looking forward to the final though! regards, slowest_guy_on_hltv

2016-11-20 21:41

12 replies

thoorin wrong again xD twitter.com/Thooorin/status/799761921356..

2016-11-20 21:44

4 replies

de_stroyed

2016-11-20 21:42

PROFESIONAL THORIN

2016-11-20 21:43

2 replies

it was only a prediction I also had Astralis winning against SK but then device had an awful series...

2016-11-20 22:49

1 reply

Device peforming on semis, i arent think that

2016-11-21 00:54

Woah you rekted him

gj brah fastest guy not the fastest anymore!

YOU DID IT MY FRIEND BLIAT

I'll rest in ur shadow, legend.

LUL getting rekt by blyat

gg sk, well deserved. astralis still has work to do to be at the same level as SK.

2016-11-20 21:47

gj beating fastest guy

2016-11-20 23:58

Astralis surely had some balls to not ban train against SK and to be honest, they did more than expected, ofcourse logical thing is banning train versus SK, they did so well but there was fer, he singlehandedly faced Astralis on train, it was amazing 4k he did for map point, yes he did ace vs antieco but cmon that 4k was one of most amazing plays in last 3months maybe. On mirage Astralis looked like tired and demoralized after losing train but they regained some of their strength after switching to CT, literally their B hold was on point but that wasn't enough and they lost the map. Once again device couldn't do impact on very important match, if he start doing impact on such important matches astralis surely will be on better places. Map pool of match was clearly best maps of SK so SK was clear favourites on this map pool and likely so they won it, Astralis surely looks like improved but seems they need some more time, maybe we will see another quarter at least on next major or maybe more but its too soon to talk about it. Player of the match was clearly fer with 95.5 adr and 1.41 rating on both maps in total.

38 replies

hahah you failed

rekt

RIP

OMG

REKT

HAHAHAHA, GET REKT ROFLLL

noob

Ayy lmao, Fastest_Guy #2

Name checks out

not the fastest anymore

so bad LUL

LUL not fastest

Second:(

GET FUKED ARAB

YOU GOT BEATEN, NOOOOOOO

nt but not fastest anymore

HAHAHAH YOU SUCK

You era is over my friend

hahaha u fucked up this time my Admin friend =D

not so fast

HAHHAHAHA LOL GET R E K T

Rekt, how does it feel to lose your title?

HAHAHHAHHA

2nd fastest guy on hltv hahaha fail

LUL #2 AND SHIT ANALYSIS

2016-11-20 21:45

2016-11-20 21:48

OWNED Y O U L O S E

2016-11-20 21:50

Just retire already 4Head

GOT OWNED LMAOOOO LEAVE THIS SITE ALREADY YOU SUCK

2016-11-20 21:54

2016-11-20 21:58

second fastest

2016-11-20 22:00

Get rekted

2016-11-20 22:01

rip u era

2016-11-20 22:08

HAHAHAHAHAHA, GET REKT U FUCK

2016-11-20 22:28

NT NOOB

2016-11-20 23:39

LOL YOU'RE BAD

2016-11-20 23:43

IZI

nip will win anyway

Well GG

tacoGOD

DEUS PERDOA, TACO NAO!

Nicolai 'device' Reedtz26-42-1654.20.65

Go SK! We are proud WE ARE FROM BRAZIL BITCH astralis choked hard on train taco doing good MIRACLES HAPPENING BOISS

let's goooooooooo boysssssss

what a match!

VAI PASSAR O TRACTOR! #RUNSKG Device tried so hard to eco frag that he actually manage to match their teammates in frags. WP Device top 3 world

Cheaters

Go tell mommy BabyRage

2016-11-20 22:29

Why dont you go? Oh wait, your mom probably got killed in some useless gang-drug-fight since the walls of your dwelling house could not stop the bullets.

2016-11-21 07:01

Taco top1 2016

hayirli olsun ilk defa kariya gitmek icin satmadilar

people think sk win 2-0 finals but actually is faze win

3 replies

yes, thorin, yes...

2016-11-20 21:56

Lol, doesn't matter who plays them, SK will run over.

2016-11-20 22:30

yeah haha sk really ran nip over :P

2016-11-21 22:37

gg wp

fnx lagging behind but their teammates are on fire.

ez as always

,,as always" :) hltv.org/match/2304228-renegades-sk-esl-..

2016-11-20 21:51

where is vp pussies ? they win one lan and hide for not lose anymore what a retards

2016-11-20 22:05

Lmao mad brazilian xddd u cannot stand that SK Lost to some shit t3 team. Ps i don't cheer for vp lmao. Stay delusional with your TOP1 SK, WE FRIENDLY WE LOYAL WE LEFT LUMONOSITY

2016-11-21 06:13

ASTRALIS IS SEMIFINAL LUL

TACO was breaking the rules once again. Not surprised.

youtube.com/watch?v=sY-CmLL9HOs ez 4 fer

2016-11-20 22:31

hltv.org/match/2306716-astralis-sk-iem-o..

ggwp! astralis <3 great matchs <3

De_stroyed Ez 4 sk

ez for the best team in the world. cry more please silvers, salty tears taste good xD #RUNSKG

MOM, TELL DADDY SK IS CHEATING

Come back stronger Astralis

Device IS the problem

sk cheating and bla bla bla bla... say more...

SK gods showing why they are so dangerous, even after other teams put in all that work to dent their map pool so heavily. Pity we didn't see Overpass because there are surely some good adjustments worked out by FalleN. The toughest thing truly is holding a top spot with the huge target on your back and any weakness gets spotted by all the demo analysts. Dazed earning his spot, great comments all event, respect. Love how he makes so many key things so clear for people who don't watch the games constantly. It's such a competitive scene that evolves quite a lot, easy to get lost in all the data

CajunB to dig. Dig improves. Karrigan to FaZe. FaZe improves. Meanwhile, Astralis are in freefall. What does it mean? Find out who is the TRUE problem NEXT time... when they inevitably make another faulty roster change.

They reached the semifinals, not exactly free falling there

2016-11-20 21:49

FaZe are in their honey-moon, give them 3months and they will fall once again

2016-11-20 22:40

Astralis Astrali Astral Astra Astr Ast As A C Ch Cho Chok Choke

5 replies

sad m8, astralis seem stronk right now, i'm favela fangay but i hope astralis step up ;/

2016-11-20 21:59

they wont :D. bringing glaive in was the right move but device is still the ultimate choker :()

2016-11-21 00:14

i also think that's the problem, hard when your star player has a mental block on important hours :/

2016-11-21 00:43

yes. :() xyp also had a pretty poor ct side on train but luckily glaive, kjaerbye and dupreeh were playing real good

2016-11-21 00:46

yea, if i'm not mistaken, kjar and gla1ve finished with 0 kd diff, if dev had stepped up they could have at least reached the 3rd map, also fnx had pretty bad series in the end, so it was a 4v4 after all but surely dev makes a bigger difference than fnx to their respective teams, you kno

2016-11-21 00:53

ferGOD

GG EZ SK Gaming <333

ty abdu <3

2016-11-20 22:04

Device was Astralis best player in groups. Come semis and he is completely out of the game, def some issue he is having

2016-11-20 22:02

Haha.... SK is a monster!!!

2016-11-20 22:10

Thank you HLTV, we appreciate that! Let's go to the final my TEAM, my PROUD! We smart, we loyal, we friendly, we are from BRAZIL! <3 Kreygasm

2016-11-20 22:25

gla1ve: "So much potential to work with" Nicolai 'device' Reedtz 26-42-1654.20.65

2016-11-20 22:27

Device choking as always

2016-11-20 22:46

device should just retire

2016-11-20 22:52

So much hate and fanboyism here, lol

2016-11-20 22:58

when astralis beat sk, sk were noobs, lose to tier 3 bla bla bla now where's all the danish flags saying get rekt monkeys and shit. when u talk shit too soon thats what happens

2016-11-20 23:34

You are pretty fucking blind if you see Danish flags insulting SK everywhere.

2016-11-20 23:56

GG veryyyyy dificult WP astralis

2016-11-20 23:48

-Device +BOT Wilson

2016-11-20 23:55

Taco and Fer are playing really well this tournament. A lot of impact kills, mainly from Taco. This guy got a lot of important kills and crucial clutches. If Fnx stepped up his game, SK would destroy teams again.

2016-11-21 00:11

byebye botstralis :=) SOUTH AMERICA > ALL BYE KIDS

2016-11-21 10:28

I watched all of the SK-Astralis game. SK played the best but really it could have gone either way! I think that SK isn't playing up to their best right now. I really hoped that Astralis had won.

2016-11-22 14:44