Picture courtesy of PGL
With the group stages now a thing of the past, 4 teams remained to battle it out in the playoff stages.
Semi-finals
The semi-finals took place on February 8th and were B)ears vs Cloud 9 and Team Liquid vs Team Secret. The two winning teams from these games would proceed to a winner’s final, while the losing teams would move to a loser’s bracket to fight between elimination or a spot at the long road to the grand finals.
Without surprise it was both B)ears and Team Liquid that emerged triumphant from their respective games, earning them a spot against each other in the winner’s final. This matched C9 vs Secret in the loser’s bracket playoff, a game that most believed Secret would win.
Loser’s bracket
The series between Secret and C9 began with C9 taking a fairly convincing win in game 1. With a Luna almost doubling the net-worth of any Secret player, and a PA at the ready too, it didn’t take too long for Secret to fold. Game 2 saw the Secret we all know, as they picked up the Luna themselves, with a Templar Assassin. Secret ripped through the C9 line-up, leaving them no chance to get kills or maintain any sort of farm – before thirty minutes, the series was tied at 1-1.
The game begun with both teams claiming very aggressive kills but it didn’t take much more than ten minutes for C9 to start pulling ahead and finding better trades. By seventeen minutes into the game, C9 had already dropped the bottom lane barracks and while Team Secret attempted to pull themselves back into the game it was too little too late. With a horribly under-farmed Luna, Secret would throw in the towel at twenty-eight minutes and accept their elimination from the DAC EU qualifiers.
Winner’s Final
With both Team Liquid and B)ears looking extremely strong going into this match, it was great to see that both teams performing brilliantly. In the end, after a full 3 game series that saw an hour long game 2 which was definitely the turning point in the series (and some of the best plays in the tournament), it would be Team Liquid that emerged victorious. With that, Liquid claimed their spot in the grand finals – while B)ears would be moving into the loser bracket final to play against C9.
Later today we will witness the culmination of the DAC EU qualifier when C9 and B)ears meet to battle in the loser’s bracket final for a spot in the grand finals to take on Team Liquid.
