Action underway at Intel Extreme Masters Melbourne

MOUZ and The MongolZ staged successful comebacks Monday to kick off the $300,000 Intel Extreme Masters Melbourne 2025 in Australia.

Sixteen teams are competing in the Counter-Strike 2 tournament, culminating with a top prize of $125,000 in Sunday's grand final.

MOUZ and The MongolZ both rallied for 2-1 wins in the upper-bracket quarterfinals in Group A, where fellow group members GamerLegion and FaZe Clan both scored 2-0 sweeps.

The upper-bracket quarterfinals in Group B saw Team Vitality and Team Falcons post sweeps and Team Liquid and Natus Vincere earn 2-1 victories.

The top three teams from each group advance to the playoffs, with group stage winners moving to the semifinals, runners-up advancing to the quarterfinals as high seeds, and third-place teams advancing the quarterfinals as the low seeds. The single-elimination playoffs begin on Friday. All matches are best-of-three until Sunday's best-of-five grand final.

After a 13-6 loss to BIG on Inferno, MOUZ responded with a 13-9 win on Mirage and a 13-8 victory on Ancient. The MongolZ dropped a 13-11 decision to Complexity on Anubis before posting a 16-13 win on Ancient and a 13-10 win on Inferno. GamerLegion defeated 3DMAX 13-4 on Ancient and 13-8 on Inferno. FaZe Clan posted consecutive 13-11 wins against paiN Gaming on Anubis and Inferno.

In Group B, Vitality beat FlyQuest 13-2 on Anubis and 13-8 on Nuke. Liquid sandwiched a 13-8 win on Dust II and a 13-10 win on Ancient around a 13-8 loss to Virtus.pro on Mirage. Falcons posted 13-8 and 13-9 wins on Nuke and Dust II, respectively, to take down SAW. Natus Vincere overcame a 13-9 loss to MIBR on Anubis with a 13-5 victory on Mirage and a 13-9 decision on Inferno.

Tuesday's schedule:

Group A

--MOUZ vs. GamerLegion (upper-bracket semifinals)

--FaZe Clan vs. TheMongolZ (upper-bracket semifinals)

--BIG vs. 3DMAX (lower-bracket quarterfinals)

--paiN Gaming vs. Complexity (lower-bracket quarterfinals)

Group B

--Team Vitality vs. Team Liquid (upper-bracket semifinals)

--Team Falcons vs. Natus Vincere (upper-bracket semifinals)

--FlyQuest vs. Virtus.pro (lower-bracket quarterfinals)

--SAW vs. MIBR (lower-bracket quarterfinals)

--Field Level Media