rain on IEM Dallas crowd: "They were very loud compared to the size"
It has been an up-and-down start to the year for FaZe, which has included highs of closing out the Intel Grand Slam with a win at ESL Pro League Season 17, with the star-studded roster also nearly missing the Major, having to go through the last chance qualifier to make it to Paris. IEM Dallas showed that FaZe are still one of the best teams in the world and only a loss in their 59-round marathon third map against ENCE prevented them from making it further. Now the International squad have a chance to close out the first half of the year on a high at the BLAST Premier Spring Finals in Washington, D.C.
FaZe started off strong with a comfortable 2-0 over Astralis, who had shown some impressive form themselves in Dallas, and will now be facing off against Heroic in a rematch of the team's quarterfinal battle at the BLAST.tv Paris Major. After their win Håvard "rain" Nygaard spoke to Dust2.us' Samuel "Draik04" Popkes about their opening win, the Heroic matchup, and what it felt like to have the full support of the IEM Dallas crowd.
Congratulations on the win! How does it feel to start off with a win, especially after the slow starts you have had at previous events?
It feels really good, it has been a long time since we have had this start in a tournament, so it feels good for the team and is a good confidence boost.
Astralis played really well at Dallas recently, did you anticipate this much being closer?
I thought it would be closer, but in Dallas they had device going nuclear in their matches and he wasn't there today, but I think they are going to be better going forward in this tournament.
What do you think was the key to success today, do you think it was as simple as device didn't show up?
We just played really good as a team, everyone showed up, we played off each other really well and we had clean comms today.
In Dallas you guys were the crowd favorites because of Twistzz; as a Norwegian player who doesn't get to play in front of a "home crowd" so to speak, how does it feel to have that support?
It feels good, it was the same feeling going into Cologne and Antwerp against NAVI. We had the crowd on our side but I think that's coming from an International team when there is no clear favorite team in the finals. So we have had it before but I really enjoyed the crowd there, they were very loud compared to the size of the crowd.
You are facing Heroic next, how does it feel to face them again with the last time being the Major quarterfinal?
We have some unfinished business, it is three BO3's in a row they have beaten us so we have to step up tomorrow and play the same way we did today and it will be a good game.
This is the fourth event for you guys within quick succession, do you feel like you have managed to build up momentum over these tournaments?
No, I don't feel like we have that much momentum. Even though we won Pro League it didn't feel like we got that much momentum for it, it was more like getting something off our shoulders finally closing out the Grand Slam and getting it. Right now we are playing and having fun and just have to have a good ending to the season.
There is no Major in the last half of the year, do you guys have any clear goals for the second half of the year?
Of course, there is no Major to be a goal but there will still be big tournaments. We are starting off with Cologne as well and that's a big one, it is a bit weird it's after the player break this year so people might be rusty coming into it. So there are still goals and tournaments we can win.
FaZe will continue their run at the BLAST Premier Spring Finals later today as they're set to face off against Heroic at 07:00PM, vying for a spot in the semifinals of the event.
