Liquid waves goodbye to BIG
Liquid have not looked their best lately, with a three match losing streak hampering their progress as a new squad headed into one of the biggest events of the year. A poor match against Astralis saw the North American-European team look down, but not out. With their matchup against the BIG Academy core, there were hopes that Liquid would be able to get themselves back on track and make it into the Lanxess.
The match started out on BIG's pick of Vertigo, a map that Liquid have not always played well on in the past. However, with rumors of a seven-map pool once again the cards for the team, it appears that Vertigo might a land that Liquid have decided to travel on. Liquid emerged with a strong T-side, jumping out to an 8-3 lead, before letting the Germans creep back into the game. The second was eerily similar as Liquid pulled away to a 15-9 lead, only to let BIG get 13 rounds before slamming the door shut.
With Liquid then getting on their own pick of Mirage, the hope was that Liquid would easily take the series 2-0. However, BIG would start to jump out to a lead and would win the first gun round, prompting Karim "Krimbo" Moussa to wave his hand goodbye at Liquid in a good nature banter. However, Liquid would win the next round thanks to a force-up, prompting Robert "Patsi" Isyanov to respond with his own wave. From then on, Liquid was in the driver's seat, even if the scoreline was evenly matched throughout the Liquid T-side.
However, the CT side was almost an instruction manual in how to conduct a disaster. Liquid speedrun their way to a 14th round, but let BIG back into the game and would inevitably force an Overtime, just to lose it. HLTV gave the odds of BIG winning the match in regulation at 0.7% and odds of Overtime at 6%, meaning this was a characteristically North American choke.
All that did though was delay the inevitable. With Overpass as the deciding map, Liquid made sure not to ruin their comfortable CT-side start as they sprinted to an 8-2 lead that would inevitably become a dominant 10-5 lead at the half. The second half was in Liquid's advantage once more as they continued their momentum as they cruised to a 16-9 win to secure the series and send them to the next round.
Liquid are scheduled to play 9ine tomorrow in a bid to make it to the group stage of IEM Cologne 2023.
LiquidBIG| Liquid |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Mareks 'YEKINDAR' Gaļinskis |
80 - 56 | +24 | 92.8 | 74.4% | 1.39 |
 Keith 'NAF' Markovic |
70 - 51 | +19 | 83.9 | 76.7% | 1.28 |
 Robert 'Patsi' Isyanov |
68 - 63 | +5 | 81.2 | 61.1% | 1.08 |
 Aleks 'Rainwaker' Petrov |
49 - 56 | -7 | 63.8 | 74.4% | 0.95 |
 Josh 'oSee' Ohm |
53 - 54 | -1 | 62.2 | 66.7% | 0.95 |
| BIG |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Elias 's1n' Stein |
60 - 65 | -5 | 77.3 | 77.8% | 1.07 |
| Karim 'Krimbo' Moussa |
64 - 63 | +1 | 73.9 | 67.8% | 1.00 |
 Efekan 'S3NSEY' Topaloglu |
50 - 55 | -5 | 57.7 | 65.6% | 0.92 |
| Johannes 'tabseN' Wodarz |
49 - 67 | -18 | 70.4 | 67.8% | 0.91 |
| David 'prosus' Hesse |
56 - 70 | -14 | 68.2 | 62.2% | 0.88 |
