Rise Nation complete reverse sweep against Gale Force; to CEVO S13 Grand Final
The Upper Bracket Final of the 13th CEVO Main season was between the Canadian upstarts of Rise Nation and the Argentinian side of Gale Force. The two sides vetoed the game down to Overpass, Mirage and a randomly picked map of Cobblestone as a decider.
With it all to play for, as the victor of this game guarantees a spot directly into the Grand Final. The two teams kicked it off on Overpass and Gale Force used their T-side start to their advantage, picking up the pistol and racing to the first buy round to keep their tally high. A small worry saw Jonathan “Jonji” Carey pick up two careful CZ-75 kills as Rise claim an eco, but Gale Force immediately bounced back to take another two rounds.
With Gale Force taking a quite far lead, seeing them up to 8-2, Rise once again took an eco win thanks to strong individual play from Will "dazzLe" Loafman. The two sides traded rounds after that, before Rise took the final round at the half to keep them in reach, but the Argentinians held a 10-5 lead thanks to some exceptional play from Guillermo "guishorro" Areco and Jonathan "JonY BoY" Muñoz throughout the half.
With Gale Force moving onto their CT-side, they appeared to keep their pressure up taking the pistol-round. Once again Rise Nation secured a force-buy/eco win against Gale Force in the round immediately following, but Gale Force decided to give the Canadians a taste of their own medicine and win their own force buy. Tomás "tomi" Guardia started to come alive in the second half, with him chaining rounds where he grabbed multiple kills as his team reached 14-6 in score.
Rise Nation manage to get a reprieve in the form of one round, before Gale Force secured the final two rounds to give them a 16-7 win.
Next up was Mirage. Gale Force started on the CT-side, but that didn't stop them from starting a not dissimilar from the first map, gaining a 4-0 lead. From there Rise looked like they were going to be able to get into the game and take their pick, before Gale Force and the power of JonY BoY saw them ride on to a 7-1 lead.
Rise then managed to secure a top A-site take to grab another round, but then lost the following round to a JonY BoY 3k. In what appears to be a bit of a theme, Rise picked up a force-buy win which they moved onto finally pick up more than one round in a row, but Gale Force were still leading at 8-6, before them managing to grab the final round of the half.
With Rise now on the CT-side, they kicked off by taking the pistol-round and it's followers to even the game at 9-9. Gale Force weren't to let them take a lead just yet and ran to a 13-10 lead. From this point, Rise's players shifted up a gear to even the scores once again, but Gale Force put their first foot forward on to taking the win by getting that 14th round.
But Rise weren't letting go of this tie just yet, and took the game all the way to the maximum rounds available and claiming it 16-14, partly in thanks to a strong show from Andy "vSa" Xu.
Finally the two move onto Cobblestone, in a one-map shoot-out for the win. Rise took another pistol round, and quickly racked up a 3-0 lead. Gale Force took the first gun round, and thanks to Edgar "MarKE" Jimenez, the Argentenian team brought the score back to 3-4. Rise Nation took control of the half after that however, and with many huge plays by Jonji, the North American squad acquired nine rounds in the first half, ending with a 6-9 scoreline.
The IGL for Rise, vSa, began the second half well, and secured the pistol round for his team, which the managed to convert into two more. Gale Force however won the first gun round again, and began to mount a strong comeback. Rise Nation stopped them in their tracks however, as Jonji continued his rampage, reaching a 30 bomb in the final round, to close out the map 16-10 and the series 2-1.
Rise NationGale Force| Rise Nation |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Jonathan 'Jonji' Carey |
66 - 59 | +7 | 89.3 | 68.4% | 1.21 |
 Will 'dazzLe' Loafman |
57 - 57 | +0 | 83.0 | 68.4% | 1.10 |
| Kaleb 'moose' Jayne |
51 - 46 | +5 | 73.4 | 65.8% | 1.08 |
| Andy 'vSa' Xu |
56 - 54 | +2 | 75.7 | 75.9% | 1.02 |
| Brandon 'Ace' Winn |
37 - 57 | -20 | 46.7 | 63.3% | 0.72 |
| Gale Force |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Jonathan 'JonY BoY' Muñoz |
57 - 49 | +8 | 80.1 | 77.2% | 1.22 |
| Tomás 'tomi' Guardia |
60 - 59 | +1 | 82.3 | 62.0% | 1.05 |
| Guillermo 'guishorro' Areco |
55 - 57 | -2 | 78.2 | 64.6% | 1.04 |
| Matias 'tutehen' Canale |
52 - 49 | +3 | 72.6 | 70.9% | 1.00 |
 Edgar 'MarKE' Maldonado |
48 - 53 | -5 | 67.9 | 64.6% | 0.94 |
Rise Nation now advance to the grand final of CEVO Main Season 13, while Gale Force will wait to play the winner of the losers bracket in the consolidation final.
