Natus Vincere beat MIBR in two maps; to Major final

Natus Vincere kicked the series off against MIBR with a win on Overpass, 16-10, and followed it up by taking Dust2, 16-5, to secure a spot in the grand final of the Major where they will face the winner of Astralis vs. Liquid.

A triple by Egor "⁠flamie⁠" Vasilyev in the first pistol round helped his team take the first pistol round on the Terrorist side of Overpass. Natus Vincere then struggled but were able to win against the forcebuy and full eco to make it 3-0. Two opening frags from Gabriel "⁠FalleN⁠" Toledo with the AWP and two by Marcelo "⁠coldzera⁠" David on A got the American team on the board in the fourth round. MIBR then followed it up against two AKs a Galil and two pistols as Jake "⁠Stewie2K⁠" Yip denied Denis "⁠electroNic⁠" Sharipov a 1vs3 clutch. With 3-3 on the board, MIBR were able to take the lead for the first time this map in a clean sweep against an eco. Natus Vincere were then able to make it a 4vs4 as Oleksandr "⁠s1mple⁠" Kostyliev got two kills to close out a 2vs2 afterplant situation.

s1mple then won a 1vs1 afterplant against Fernando "⁠fer⁠" Alvarenga to get the CIS side back ahead and pushing MIBR into an eco and a forcebuy. The latter of the two was won by MIBR as their pistols stopped a late A execute to keep it close, 5-6, but Natus Vincere then took control of the economy and won the crucial rounds to make it a 10-5 scoreline before switching sides.

Natus Vincere then won the pistol round with a 4vs3 retake on B to further increase their lead and to try and run away with the first map of the series. The CIS side then followed it up winning a retake on A against the forcebuy before Ioann "⁠Edward⁠" Sukhariev clutched a big 1vs2 on B the following round to make it 13-5. With their back against the wall, down 5-15, fer got two crucial entries on electroNic and s1mple on A to keep his team alive.

MIBR then started to make an impressive round, winning round after round with strikes on both bomb sites to stay in the game, controlling the economy and not giving Natus Vincere a chance. Having made it to 10 rounds, MIBR kept cruising on the attacking side until s1mple and electroNic opened up a round on an A execute by MIBR, and although coldzera traded both of them, flamie closed the round out with three kills to give his team the 1-0 lead.

Dust2 started out with Natus Vincere on the Counter-Terrorist side taking the pistol round and following it up with the two anti-ecos. s1mple then had a big three-kill round and defused the bomb to keep his team in the lead, and after winning two more for a 6-0 lead forced MIBR to take a tactical timeout. Natus Vincere then made it 7-0, putting the Brazilian-American side deep into a hole early on in the second map.

Finally, MIBR were able to make a big play on B, planting the bomb with FalleN getting a triple to get his team on the board for the first time on Dust2. The American team then followed it up with another B play, making it 2-7, before Tarik "⁠tarik⁠" Celik opened up the following round with a quick AWP kill in A long to set up his team for 3-7. Natus Vincere then stacked Short and crushed MIBR’s momentum to secure the half and win it out 10-5.

Natus Vincere then won the second pistol round after overtaking the B site and securing the afterplant, following it up to keep a safe distance from MIBR, getting closer and closer to the final. Without letting their foot off the gas, Natus Vincere sealed the deal on Dust2, winning out the half, map, and series to advance to the grand final.