The EVPs and Best Five of IEM Katowice

Five players take home Exceptionally Valuable Player awards from the first Big Event of 2024.

IEM Katowice kicked off 2024 with a bang. Spirit confirmed their ascendancy in stunning fashion, dropping just one map en route to glory in Spodek. We saw Danil "⁠donk⁠" Kryshkovets rise to challenge after challenge, equalling the Big Event rating record (1.70) and easing to his second MVP in as many eligible events.

But it was not just the donk show: along with the Most Valuable Player (MVP) award, we are also handing out Exceptionally Valuable Player (EVP) awards to players that shone within their teams but missed out on the top prize.

So here are the first EVPs of 2024, ordered with our usual MVP and Top 20 methodology.

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We start with Ilya "⁠m0NESY⁠" Osipov, who has been a shining beacon for G2 in Counter-Strike 2 as other individuals on his side struggle.

He began the tournament with a 39-12 (2.07 rating) map against HEROIC, and ended the decider of that series with a 25-10 (1.97) to save G2 from the lower bracket, almost entirely on his own.

m0NESY added three more stellar peaks against Monte and HEROIC, all while maintaining a high floor throughout the event. He earned 1.17 kills per round win along the way, a staggeringly high figure second only to donk (1.36).

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There were questions over how David "⁠frozen⁠" Čerňanský would adapt to a slight change of T side role in FaZe but his adaptability (and keeping all of his CT positions) have ensured a smooth transition.

He was FaZe's highest-rated player at the event (1.22) and led the side in round wins (1.06 KPRW, 108.1 ADRW). His stats are slightly inflated by his stomping of Rebels but he also put up a 1.37 rating against G2 and 1.29 against MOUZ in successive arena matches to cement his case as an EVP.

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It is easy to forget, in all the donk mania, how well Dmitry "⁠sh1ro⁠" Sokolov has bounced back in Spirit colors.

He benched himself on Cloud9 after recording his second-lowest LAN event rating of all time at IEM Sydney, bemoaning the status of the game and having to wait three months for his next offline tournament.

But his decision to link up with donk and Spirit is paying off in spades already, allowing sh1ro to act as the perfect foil, the closer to his opener, for one of the deadliest one-two punches in Counter-Strike.

donk's supremacy meant sh1ro took a back seat at times in Poland, and his 54% survival rate is helped by saving in 21% of round losses, but when called upon he still delivered, recording high peaks vs Natus Vincere and stepping up with a 1.35 rating in the grand final.

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Helvijs "⁠broky⁠" Saukants received two donkings this event, and his 0.75 rating vs Spirit in five maps has tanked his stats significantly.

But in FaZe's map wins he was actually their frag leader (119 kills to frozen's 94), and rating leader (1.40) if you exclude the frozen-led stomp of Rebels.

The AWPer won eight clutches throughout Katowice, top-fragged in both quarter-final maps against G2, and had a solid semi-final versus MOUZ too — leading to enough impact to earn an EVP despite his struggles against the tournament's top dog.

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Olek "⁠hades⁠" Miskiewicz is the last EVP, thanks to his hugely impactful peak against then-No. 1 Vitality and a superb performance in Spodek even as ENCE succumbed to defeat vs Falcons.

The 11-13 loss in the decider to Falcons will haunt ENCE for a while, but no blame can be laid on hades' door, who ended the decider with a 1.49 rating and carried them to victory on Overpass with 26 frags and a 1.80 rating.

His numbers are helped by an 18% saving rate and just 60% of his kills came in round wins, but when you look at where his peaks came this is as much about his teammates as himself.

ENCE's run was against three playoff teams and Vitality, and hades was good in all three non-seeding series and is a worthy EVP.

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Honorable mentions

Five EVPs is a bit lower than we normally hand out for events of this size, and this is largely down to the team performances of semi-finalists MOUZ and Falcons, as well as the super-carries of donk and m0NESY.

Myroslav "⁠zont1x⁠" Plakhotia ended the event with quite low output (just 0.66 KPR) but his frags dealt serious impact and Spirit won 90.9% of rounds in which he earned a multi-kill.

Dorian "⁠xertioN⁠" Berman had a strong decider against Cloud9 before an astronomical 1.78 rating and 35-16 K-D in map one against GamerLegion, but fell off in playoffs. The same was true of Nikola "⁠NiKo⁠" Kovač, who had strong individual maps against Monte and HEROIC but let G2 down in quarters and had a lower floor than usual EVPs.

Mohammad "⁠BOROS⁠" Malhas came closest out of Falcons, but Pavle "⁠Maden⁠" Bošković also was in the running and it was a team performance and fast-paced calls from Marco "⁠Snappi⁠" Pfeiffer that took the Saudi organization to semi-finals.

Finally there is Ihor "⁠w0nderful⁠" Zhdanov, who put up a 1.64 rating in Spirit's only map loss all tournament off the back of a monumental 1vs4 clutch, but also had some quiet spells against fairly weak opposition.

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We close with our traditional role-based best five of the event, where Leonid "⁠chopper⁠" Vishnyakov leads the squad thanks to Spirit's impossible 68.9% T side round win percentage.

We can also fit in zont1x as the anchor, whose 1.16 rating is an impressive outlay for a player in a team with two stars as domineering as sh1ro and donk.

The star trio is then made up of the event's three most valuable players, donk, m0NESY, and frozen with sh1ro unlucky to miss out.