BIG squander chance to take down ENCE

The favorites prevailed in a tight game of dominant CT sides.

In the final game of day one at the BLAST Premier Spring Final, BIG and ENCE crossed paths in what was their first meeting since the PGL Stockholm Major in November. The veto resulted in Mirage and Nuke starting off the series, and an incredibly CT-sided affair followed.

ENCE looked spectacular on the defensive side of Mirage, 13-2, but it was BIG who recovered in an even more impressive fashion and reached map point first. However, Tizian "⁠tiziaN⁠" Feldbusch's 30-bomb and the team's valiant effort would be for naught, as Pavle "⁠Maden⁠" Bošković enabled a victory for his side with key frags in round 30.

A similar story repeated on Nuke, where Johannes "⁠tabseN⁠" Wodarz's men started off 9-1 up and finished the half with an 11-4 lead, but dropped a crucial 5v2 that allowed ENCE to get back into it and sweep the series 2-0. The tournament continues tomorrow when BIG will play an elimination game against Natus Vincere, while ENCE will be aiming to secure a semi-final spot over OG.

Mirage was a game of two halves and great example of how dominant the CT side can be in the current meta. tabseN's triple won BIG the second-round force-buy, but that ended up being one of just two rounds the German squad mustered on their offense as Maden and Lotan "⁠Spinx⁠" Giladi had a field day.

With a 13-2 half, Mirage seemed like an open and shut case, but BIG managed to mirror that result, looking supremely confident with a Florian "⁠syrsoN⁠" Rische - Josef "⁠faveN⁠" Baumann double AWPing and on-point rifling from tabseN and especially tiziaN. In the end, ENCE stopped a 12-round streak from BIG to muster overtime and ultimately clinch out the game, 19-16.

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BIG neutralized ENCE's T side on Nuke just like they did on Mirage, grabbing a 9-1 lead off the bat. A pistol-armor buy instigated a late-half comeback from Marco "⁠Snappi⁠" Pfeiffer's squad, as they won three out of the last five to grab a lifeline going on to CT.

Down 11-4, ENCE won the pistol and follow-up, but suffered significant economic damages in the latter round. BIG had a chance to put the game to bed in the first buy, finding themselves 2v5 up and on the verge of breaking ENCE's money, but Snappi and Spinx capitalized on a sloppy B crunch to turn it around and go on a five-round streak.

With the momentum secured, ENCE put up a dominant CT half, dropping just two rounds as they completed the comeback to make it 16-13.