3DMAX's stellar T sides eliminate BIG from Katowice

The Frenchmen stay alive in Poland after Maka led by example on both maps.

3DMAX will face Eternal Fire in Group A's lower bracket semi-final after ending BIG's IEM Katowice campaign in a 2-0 series (13-11 Ancient, 13-6 Inferno).

Bryan "⁠Maka⁠" Canda led by example with 1.53 and 1.76 ratings, top fragged on both maps and won two clutches early on Inferno to ensure a dominant victory for his side.

Clutches in general will haunt BIG when they look back on this series as Lucas "⁠Lucky⁠" Chastang also won two on Inferno to make the map far more lopsided than it should have been.

3DMAX have two more series to win if they want to reach the Spodek Arena, but it is a treacherous path with wins over Eternal Fire and the winner of G2 vs. FaZe required.

Date	Matches
IEM Katowice 2025
03/02/2025	Eternal Fire 19:35 3DMAX	Match

3DMAX's T sides overwhelm

Maka dealt BIG the death blow in more than just fragging as his mid-round calls and executes helped 3DMAX convert rounds despite being outnumbered on some of their attacks on Ancient.

"We stood right, we were pretty much in the right spot every time," Johannes "⁠tabseN⁠" Wodarz said of losing their map pick.

"They hit us with good executes and we didn't hit our shots. We lost on B three times where he had three players, we even killed the first guy and then it collapsed."

The French team showed tenacity by easily shrugging off their defeat to Vitality, and Filip "⁠Graviti⁠" Brankovic was not to be silenced as he continued playfully taunting his opponents throughout the series.

"Karim [Krimbo], concentrate, Karim!" Graviti yelled across to BIG in French as 3DMAX extended their lead on Inferno. "Look at me, I'm Long. Concentrate, brother!"

The 21-year-old had a great start to the series with a crisp quad-kill in Middle on Ancient and ended it in style on Inferno with an insane spray transfer to Balcony for another quad-kill round.

BIG show improvement with new additions

BIG had a rocky start in Katowice, going down 0-12 in the first half of their Ancient pick to Wildcard and losing the series 2-0, but recovered to reach the main stage by beating Imperial Valkyries and HEROIC.

Another loss on their Ancient pick cost the German team in a 1-2 loss to FaZe at the start of Stage 2, and again here against 3DMAX.

However, the additions of Can "⁠kyuubii⁠" Ali and Marcel "⁠hyped⁠" Köhn have breathed new life into a BIG team that looked a shadow of anything great at the end of 2024, and tabseN walks away from the event with his head held high.

Right now I don't know what happened, but as you mentioned, yeah, until this point it was very good," he said of BIG's run.

"I'm still proud of the boys, it was a very good showing, it was the first LAN tournament with them, and I'm still proud."