NAVI have shown that they are not to be joked with, if anyone was still doubting the team’s Major win March as a fluke, as they have now gone on to win the IEM Rio on Sunday. NAVI came from 2-10 down on Ancient to muster a 3-1 score over MOUZ.
The team had a tournament run to remember capping off their struggles in the playoffs to defeat MOUZ. NAVI defeated Heroics in the semi-finals showing resilience and they were able to get that back up in the grandfinal to emerge victorious.
Although Aleksib’s team quickly got into a 2-0 lead over MOUZ with wins on Inferno and a 13-2 victory on Dust2, but their opponents tried to force a comeback with a 13-6 win on Mirage and another 10-2 CT half on Ancient, which almost made Nuke the decider.
However, NAVI embarked on an impressive defense of their lead and game by dropping just the fourth round in the second half to close out the map and match in regulation.
“We spoke about it the whole tournament; no matter how much you’re down, you can still win. But it also works both ways; no matter how much you are up, you can still lose, so keep focused.” NAVI’s jL said after the game.
The team has managed to show its quality with their sixth grand finals in a row. Some of the players who stood out for NAVI were iM and wonderful by keeping xertioN and Brollan quiet throughout the whole series.
NAVI is now close to securing the Million-dollar bonus as the yellow-and-black outfit has managed back-to-back Intel Grand Slam wins. However, they have to win two more to get the million-dollar bonus.
They could secure it with the BLAST Premier World Final in November and Counter-Strike Major campaign.
