FaZe Clan, MongolZ clinch playoff spots at PGL Cluj-Napoca

Field Level Media|published: Sun 16th February, 21:52 2025

A backlit keyboard is part of the gear online video game streamer Jordan Woodruff uses in his Gilbert home. Jordan Woodruff

FaZe Clan and The MongolZ were the first two teams to advance out of the group stage at the $1.25 million PGL Cluj-Napoca event when they won their Round 3 high matches on Sunday in Romania.

FaZe took down MOUZ 2-0 and The MongolZ outlasted paiN Gaming 2-1. The losing teams will have another chance to move on in Monday's Round 4 high matches.

Rounds 2-5 of the event will be seeded using the Buchholz system and the teams' initial seeds. All matches in the group stage are best-of-three, with the top eight teams advancing to the single-elimination playoffs. The grand final will be best-of-five.

On Sunday, FaZe swept MOUZ 13-11 on Ancient and 13-7 on Mirage. American Jonathan "EliGE" Jablonowski led the way for FaZe with 40 kills on a plus-5 kills-to-deaths differential, and Slovakia's David "frozen" Cernansky had 34 kills on a plus-9.

The MongolZ opened with a 16-13 overtime win on Inferno, but paiN drew even by eking out a 16-14 overtime win on Dust II. The final map was Mirage, where The MongolZ won 13-8. They were led by Munkhbold "Senzu" Azbayar of Mongolia (60 kills, plus-17).

In the two Round 3 low matches, Imperial Female and FlyQuest were the first two teams to be eliminated from the tournament. Complexity swept Imperial Female (13-5 on Ancient, 13-2 on Train) and SAW beat FlyQuest 2-1, sandwiching a 16-14 OT win on Inferno and a 13-9 victory on Ancient around a 13-7 loss on Dust II.

There were four Round 3 mid matches: Eternal Fire swept BIG 2-0, 3DMAX beat MIBR 2-0, Team Falcons topped Astralis 2-1 and Virtus.pro defeated Wildcard 2-0. The victors moved on to the Round 4 high matches, and the losers will play in the Round 4 low matches.

Six matches are scheduled for Monday:

Round 4 high matches

--MOUZ vs. Team Falcons

--3DMAX vs. Eternal Fire

--paiN Gaming vs. Virtus.pro

Round 4 low matches

--Wildcard vs. BIG

--Astralis vs. MIBR

--Complexity vs. SAW

PGL Cluj-Napoca prize pool:

1. $400,000

2. $187,500