AVANGAR qualify for EPICENTER Wild Card Qualifier-case opening sites

AVANGAR have defeated Imperial 2-1 in the grand final of the EPICENTER CIS Closed Qualifier to book their place at the wild card qualifier.

A total of eight teams competed in the tournament, which offered a slot at the offline wild card qualifier for the Russian event. AVANGAR made their way through to the final after a series sweep over FORZE and easing past Spirit. On the other side of the bracket, Imperial topped their three-map series over HellRaisers and then punched their ticket to the final after taking down Monolith in two maps.

The grand final kicked off on Overpass, AVANGAR's map pick, but the first half would have suggested otherwise as Rokas "⁠EspiranTo⁠" Milasauskas and his men gave no margin for error against the Kazakhstan side in the 13-2 T side half, before closing out the second half as CTs with a 16-2 map victory.

James' 1.47 rating helped AVANGAR secure the comeback on Cache

Mirage was next in the series, which saw a highly-contested first half result in Imperial barely claiming the 8-7 half advantage. EspiranTos' side marched into the second half winning the CT pistol and the subsequent anti-ecos, before Dzhami "⁠Jame⁠" Ali & company's stout offense struck back to lock down nine out of ten rounds, securing the 16-12 map victory to force the Cache decider.

Imperial came out in the decider winning five in a row right off the bat as AVANGAR struggled to hold off the Terrorists' dominant run, who claimed the 11-4 score at halftime. In the second half, AVANGAR managed to turn things around by winning five of their own before Imperial's defense ended the streak. From there, the two sides fought tooth and nail, until the Kazakhstan side finally put a nail in the coffin to secure the 16-14 map victory and a spot at the wild card qualifier.

EPICENTER 2018 CIS Closed QualifierBest of 3 AVANGAR

AVANGAR

Matchpage 2 1 6th October 2018

Imperial 2Overpass 16 16Mirage 12 16Cache 14

AVANGAR	K - D	+/-	ADR	Rating 2.0
Dzhami 'Jame' AliJame	66 - 42	+24	83.5	1.37
Timur 'buster' Tulepovbuster	50 - 50	0	59.7	0.96
Alexey 'Qikert' GolubevQikert	42 - 52	-10	63.5	0.84
Aidyn 'KrizzeN' TurlybekovKrizzeN	39 - 57	-18	68.1	0.82
Bektiyar 'fitch' Bahytovfitch	34 - 60	-26	72.5	0.78

Imperial	K - D	+/-	ADR	Rating 2.0
Rokas 'EspiranTo' MilasauskasEspiranTo	60 - 46	+14	86.6	1.31
Nemanja 'nexa' Isakovićnexa	55 - 46	+9	73.0	1.16
Ali 'hAdji' HaïnousshAdji	56 - 49	+7	74.3	1.11
Žygimantas 'nukkye' Chmieliauskasnukkye	44 - 39	+5	68.9	1.04
Eimantas 'pounh' Lazickaspounh	46 - 51	-5	71.3	0.99

AVANGAR are the fifth and final team confirmed for the offline wild card qualifier — scheduled for October 22 — joining Virtus.pro, ENCE, Swole Patrol, and 5POWER.

On October 19, the team that is ranked highest in the HLTV ranking will receive a direct invitation and will not have to participate in the qualifier.

EPICENTER 2018 features a $300,000 prize pool and will kick off on October 23 with a three-day group stage, followed by the playoffs on October 27-28 at the Park of Legends Ice Palace, in Moscow.