Spirit advance to Thunderpick playoffs, COL eliminate M80

A lights-out performance from zont1x earned his team a berth to the bracket stage.

Spirit have secured a 2-0 victory over MOUZ to make the playoffs of Thunderpick World Championship 2023, clinching victory in overtime on Ancient (16-14) before running away with MOUZ's Mirage pick (13-6).

The Russian team struggled in their Roobet Cup campaign last week, going out in joint-last place following defeats to 9z and Virtus.pro. An opening win over Complexity in Thunderpick helped them bounce back from those defeats, and now an added victory over the ESL Pro League Season 18 champions has put them through to the playoffs.

Spirit didn't have to rely solely on superstar Danil "⁠donk⁠" Kryshkovets for this win either, as it was instead Myroslav "⁠zont1x⁠" Plakhotia who stepped up with a strong effort on Ancient before blowing MOUZ out of the server on Mirage with 152 ADR, a 26-7 K-D, and 2.44 rating.

MOUZ, in turn, will have to take on Complexity in the Group C decider matchup if they hope to make the playoffs. The recent IEM Sydney finalists were knocked down to the losers' match by Spirit, but eliminated countrymen M80 to keep their own tournament hopes alive.

The team around Kamil "⁠siuhy⁠" Szkaradek might try to be protective of their playbook ahead of their upcoming appearance at CS2 Asia Championships, where they should be back to full-strength with their lineup after being forced to play IEM Sydney with a stand-in.

Date	Matches
Thunderpick World Championship 2023
31/10/2023	Complexity 16:25 MOUZ	Match

Ancient was a back-and-forth affair as neither team was truly comfortable for a prolonged period of time, the lead changing hands throughout the map in an embattled bid for control.

MOUZ came out ahead by one round at the end of the first half, but Spirit had the better start following the side swap, helped by a number of baffling Scout no scopes by Artem "⁠ArtFr0st⁠" Kharitonov and stellar multi-fragging by zont1x.

MOUZ made up for their slow start to the second half by reaching map point first, but couldn't convert that into a victory as ArtFr0st's Scout again shut down the EPL S18 champions to force overtime. There, Spirit clean-swept the CT side thanks in part to a 1v4 clutch by donk, and made full use of that buffer to eventually close the map, 16-14.

Mirage, on the other hand, was a far more one-sided affair. MOUZ managed to remain competitive in the first half of the map, posting five rounds on the T side, but simply couldn't withstand an absurd individual performance from zont1x.

The Ukrainian went 4:0 in opening duels, mustered a staggering nine multi-kill rounds in the 13-6 game, and ended the map 26-10-7 (K-A-D) to lead his team to a swift victory.