Eternal Fire survive 3DMAX comebacks to scrape into lower bracket final

The BLAST Bounty Finals runner-ups limped to victory after nearly dropping 12-5 and 11-6 leads on Anubis and Dust2.

Eternal Fire have kept themselves alive after grinding down a resilient run from 3DMAX in Katowice, recovering from a devastating 4-13 loss on Inferno with wins on Anubis (16-13) and Dust2 (13-10) to edge through to the Group A lower bracket final against FaZe.

Date	Matches
IEM Katowice 2025
04/02/2025	Eternal Fire 16:00 FaZe	Match

Engin "⁠MAJ3R⁠" Küpeli's side nearly squandered big leads on the latter two maps and could have had their momentum from BLAST Bounty fizzle out, but 3DMAX's inexperience and costly mistakes meant the French side stumbled when it mattered most, including against pistols from Eternal Fire at 10-11 on Dust2.

"There is a bit of frustration during the game when you lose those kinds of rounds," Bryan "⁠Maka⁠" Canda admitted in a post-match interview with James "⁠BanKs⁠" Banks. "Especially [against] Eternal Fire, they have a [lot] of firepower, so they are really strong.

"This is the game, this is how they play, we have to accept it, and I think sometimes we didn't. We lacked composure."

3DMAX's Inferno continues to look fearsome

3DMAX's rise in recent months has been punctuated by great teamplay and calling by Maka on the T side, with Inferno being a standout.

It has been an excellent home map — they've lost just one of their last nine on LAN, a double overtime against Vitality in Katowice — and they proved it again by devastating Eternal Fire at the start of this series.

The French team had a 60% T side winrate (vs. 51% on CT) over four maps before facing the Turks and skewed that statistic even further toward the offense with a masterclass first half, recovering from losing the pistol and conversion to post a 9-3 lead.

That was in large part thanks to a 1.95-rated and 16-8 K-D half from Pierre "⁠Ex3rcice⁠" Bulinge, including an ace to recover a 3v5 post-plant early on, and Eternal Fire never recovered from that loss with just one round added to their tally in the half.

"I'm very proud," Maka said of 3DMAX's overall showing in Katowice. "We showed something people didn't expect from us last year. We won against the teams we were supposed to beat and we put up a good fight against a better team, or even a team like Eternal Fire."

Eternal Fire stave off comebacks, barely hold on to undefeated Anubis record with jottAAA

Alarm bells were ringing for MAJ3R's side after that loss, but they too have a home map to fall back on.

The Turks are undefeated on Anubis since adding Samet "⁠jottAAA⁠" Köklü at the start of the year (6-0 record) and added a seventh win to that tally thanks in large part to the newcomer's efforts.

The former Sangal rifler combined with Özgür "⁠woxic⁠" Eker to lead Eternal Fire to an 8-4 half, posting a 14-5 K-D, 1.82 rating, and 101.2 ADR, and that lead was quickly extended to 12-4 after the break.

3DMAX will look back on their force-buy in the second half after losing the pistol with regret as once guns came up, they mustered an excellent offense of their own.

Methodical defaults and pinches into A dismantled Eternal Fire's defenses for a nine-round run into a lead in overtime, but the Frenchmen misread the Turkish team's setup in the next round and allowed Eternal Fire to find a new life to steal away victory.

Dust2 started with more of a back-and-forth, a force-buy war seeing both teams stay within touching distance of each other until Eternal Fire pulled away at the end of the half. 3DMAX won the pistol but couldn't convert against MP9s in the next, the first of two costly mistakes in the second half which Eternal Fire seized for an 11-6 lead.

Again once guns came up 3DMAX looked strong, abusing Eternal Fire into conceding Mid control early and bringing the game back to 11-10, but right when they looked good to complete the comeback, collapsed completely to woxic's Scout and pistols in a round that sealed their fate.

"It's Katowice, and it's always a good experience to be that close to the playoffs, two games away," Maka said. "If we won today I think we could have put up a good fight tomorrow, but in the end it ended up like this. We will keep working."