Imperial beat paiN; complete BLAST Spring Final team list

Gabriel "⁠FalleN⁠" Toledo's men defeated Complexity, EG Black, and paiN en route to winning the Americas Showdown.

Imperial have topped the BLAST Premier Spring Americas Showdown and qualified for the Spring Final following a 2-0 series victory over paiN in the grand final.

FalleN's men survived a hard-fought battle on Inferno at the onset of the series, Jhonatan "⁠JOTA⁠" Willian initially powering his side to a strong start on the attack before paiN found their footing in the latter moments of the first half. Imperial kept up the pressure in the second half and quickly pushed up to a 13-8 lead, but struggled to close out from that advantage as paiN began to claw back into the map. Just when it looked like Rodrigo "⁠biguzera⁠" Bittencourt's side could force overtime, however, Imperial stalled out a bombsite hit in round 30 and denied a bomb plant to take their map pick over the line.

FalleN called a phenomenal T side on Mirage to close out the series

paiN kicked off their pick of Mirage on better footing, going up 5-0 on the T side, but had little to boast about from that point onward. Imperial recovered and brought themselves within one round of their opponents by halftime before kicking off an imperious offense, phenomenal calling and multi-fragging from FalleN and Marcelo "⁠chelo⁠" Cespedes helping their team demolish their countrymen en route to a 16-9 finish.

BLAST Premier Spring Showdown 2023 AmericasBest of 3

paiN

Matchpage

0

2

2nd April 2023

Imperial

14

Inferno

16

9

Mirage

16

paiN	K - D	+/-	ADR	KAST	Rating2.0
Rodrigo 'biguzera' Bittencourtbiguzera	38 - 37	+1	80.5	69.1%	1.06
Romeu 'zevy' Roccozevy	31 - 31	0	50.6	67.3%	0.93
Felipe 'skullz' Medeirosskullz	25 - 33	-8	60.6	67.3%	0.92
Wesley 'hardzao' Lopeshardzao	26 - 37	-11	57.4	56.4%	0.77
Gabriel 'NEKIZ' SchenatoNEKIZ	25 - 42	-17	47.2	65.5%	0.69

Imperial	K - D	+/-	ADR	KAST	Rating2.0
Jhonatan 'JOTA' WillianJOTA	44 - 30	+14	90.7	78.2%	1.37
Gabriel 'FalleN' ToledoFalleN	33 - 27	+6	59.8	78.2%	1.16
Ricardo 'boltz' Prassboltz	34 - 29	+5	85.1	76.4%	1.15
Vinicius 'VINI' FigueiredoVINI	30 - 29	+1	57.4	87.3%	1.14
Marcelo 'chelo' Cespedeschelo	38 - 30	+8	67.6	76.4%	1.13

Imperial had suffered narrow losses to FURIA, SAW, and Complexity at their last international event appearance at ESL Pro League Season 17 just one month ago, but showed renewed composure and strong structure here in their qualifying effort as they took down Complexity, EG Black, and paiN to qualify for the Spring Final. Their successful path through the Showdown also provides a boon to their confidence heading into the BLAST.tv Paris Major Americas RMR, slated to take place in Monterrey, Mexico from April 6-9.

For paiN, the finals loss comes as a tough blow given that they had scored impressive wins over MIBR and Liquid to make it to the qualifying match. Still, the team's strong showing at ESL Pro League in March and their wins in the Showdown are promising for their Major aspirations as they too will be in attendance in Monterrey this upcoming week, where only five spots in Paris will be up for grabs.

The complete team list for the BLAST Premier Spring Final, which will take place from June 7-11 with $425,000 on offer, looks as follows:

G2
HEROIC
Vitality
Astralis

FaZe
Natus Vincere
Cloud9
Imperial