MongolZ, Spirit charge into IEM Katowice semifinals

Field Level Media|published: Sat 8th February, 02:27 2025

A custom gaming keyboard backlit with red LED lights waits for tactile input before Manual took on Boone County in a Rocket League match, which was streamed on YouTube on Thursday, March 5, 2020.

A triple-overtime map victory helped The MongolZ defeat Eternal Fire 2-0 on Friday in the quarterfinals of the Intel Extreme Masters Katowice event in Poland.

The other quarterfinal match also resulted in a 2-0 sweep, with Team Spirit eliminating Virtus.pro.

In the semifinals on Saturday, The Mongolz will oppose Team Vitality, and Team Spirit will face off with Natus Vincere.

Group play in the $1 million Counter-Strike: Global Offensive event featured 16 teams split into two double-elimination brackets, with all matches best-of-three. The two group-phase winners advanced directly to the playoff semifinals, the two group-phase runners-up moved to the quarterfinals as high seeds, and the two third-place teams made the quarterfinals as low seeds.

The playoffs are single elimination, with best-of-three matches for the quarterfinals and semifinals ahead of a best-of-five grand final on Sunday. The champion will earn $400,000.

On Friday, The MongolZ opened with a 13-7 win over Eternal Fire on Anubis before needing triple OT to pull out Mirage 22-18.

Garidmagnai "bLitz" Byambasuren and Sodbayar "Techno" Munkhbold each recorded 49 kills for the all-Mongolian MongolZ squad. bLitz had a team-high plus-21 kill-death differential. Ismailcan 'XANTARES' Dortkardes led all-Turkish Eternal Fire with 44 kills and a plus-5 K-D differential.

Team Spirit downed Virtus.pro 13-2 on Train and 13-9 on Ancient. Russia's Danil "donk" Kryshkovets posted 37 kills, and Russian teammate Boris "magixx" Vorobiev recorded a match-high plus-17 K-D differential. Kazakhstan's Kaisar "ICY" Faiznurov notched 22 kills and a minus-4 K-D differential.

Intel Extreme Masters Katowice prize pool:

1. $400,000

2. $180,000

3-4. $80,000

5-6. $40,000 -- Eternal Fire, Virtus.pro

7-8. $24,000 -- FaZe Clan, GamerLegion

9-12. $16,000 -- G2 Esports, 3DMAX, Astralis, Team Liquid

13-16. $10,000 -- Team Falcons, BIG, FURIA Esports, MOUZ

17-20. $4,500 -- Wildcard, paiN Gaming, MIBR, HEROIC

21-24. $2,500 -- Complexity, FlyQuest, SAW, Imperial Female

--Field Level Media