NiKo shines as FaZe overrun OpTic to book playoff spot

FaZe have assured themselves of a spot in the DreamHack Masters Stockholm playoffs after easing past OpTic in a quick two-map series.

The battle for the top spot in Group C began on FaZe's map pick, Dust2, where the European mixture hit back after losing the pistol round and took a 3-1 lead. After getting their economy back on track, OpTic picked themselves up and reclaimed the lead after putting together a small run of rounds, with star player Jakob "⁠JUGi⁠" Hansen and in-game leader Marco "⁠Snappi⁠" Pfeiffer both raising eyebrows with quad-kills.

Down 3-5, FaZe were gifted a route back into the game as they won another eco - a round that ended up tipping the scales in their favour. After that, Finn "⁠karrigan⁠" Andersen's men kept a very tight defence, and they closed out the half without losing any more rounds.

A triple-kill from Nicklas "⁠gade⁠" Gade in the second half pistol helped OpTic to overturn a 3v5 situation and kept the Danish team in the game. However, once again there was no follow-up on their part as they were caught off-guard by FaZe's Desert Eagles. The European mixture took control of proceedings after that and won the next five rounds en route to a 16-6 finish, with Nikola "⁠NiKo⁠" Kovač ending the map on 31 kills.

Carrying their momentum into Train, FaZe cruised to a 13-2 lead on the Terrorist side after shutting down any chances of OpTic stringing rounds together or building up an economy.

After switching to the Terrorist side, the Danish side won the pistol round with an A execute, but their resistance came to an end in the third round, when NiKo picked up a triple kill. With their economy in shambles, OpTic were simply helpless to stop the onslaught.