NRG eliminated, Nouns stay alive in Round 3
It's official, NRG will not be in ESL Pro League Season 20. The organization attempted to make their comeback into the title with some star North American signings but after a season in the highest level of domestic competition, they were unable to qualify for the international stage. M80 are the first squad to qualify thanks to their win last night over Wildcard.
Nouns also stayed alive in the competition as they faced a tough battle against Elevate, meaning they still have a shot at earning the last invite for the now Malta-based tournament.
To start things off, we have to talk about M80 breezing through the qualifications to ensure that we see them in the next edition of ESL Pro League. The squad proved at the Maltese competition earlier this year that they can be quite the handful and now have the chance to go even further this next time.
In playing against Wildcard, M80 showed why they are redoubtable one of the best teams from the region. They battled back on Anubis after a poor four-round offensive half to bring it to overtime and then closed it out 16-12 to give themselves the series lead heading into their own map pick.
Inferno was a much more dominant showing for M80 as this time, their T-side did not disappoint. Nine rounds on the offense helped propel them to a 16-6 victory, giving them a deserved 2-0 win and a spot at ESL Pro League.
M80Wildcard| M80 |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Mario 'malbsMd' Samayoa |
52 - 37 | +15 | 121.1 | 83.0% | 1.77 |
 Fritz 'slaxz-' Dietrich |
39 - 24 | +15 | 80.4 | 87.2% | 1.37 |
 Ethan 'reck' Serrano |
41 - 30 | +11 | 81.0 | 78.7% | 1.23 |
| Michael 'Swisher' Schmid |
25 - 31 | -6 | 63.4 | 76.6% | 1.00 |
| Elias 's1n' Stein |
25 - 27 | -2 | 66.5 | 78.7% | 0.99 |
| Wildcard |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Aran 'Sonic' Groesbeek |
32 - 38 | -6 | 83.3 | 72.3% | 1.01 |
| Josh 'JBa' Barutt |
33 - 37 | -4 | 74.9 | 70.2% | 1.00 |
| Keller 'SLIGHT' Nilan |
31 - 37 | -6 | 66.4 | 70.2% | 0.93 |
| Adam 'Grizz' Golden |
29 - 36 | -7 | 66.7 | 66.0% | 0.90 |
 Peter 'stanislaw' Jarguz |
23 - 35 | -12 | 54.2 | 57.4% | 0.77 |
The other sad story of last night is NRG falling to Party Astronauts and being eliminated from the competition. The roster have had some struggles so far in 2024 and seemed to finally have a solid five-man lineup together that they could have success with. However, Justin "FaNg" Coakley sought out revenge against his former organization as he utterly dominated in the 2-0 sweep.
While Party Astronauts showed a weaker CT-side on NRG's pick of Inferno, it was the T-side where FaNg was truly unlocked. With 10 kills and a 1.99 HLTV Rating, he helped win seven rounds as PA stole a 13-8 win. Things only went from bad to worse for NRG on Ancient as they struggled to defend against their opponent's T-side and eventually went down 13-3.
NRGParty Astronauts| NRG |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jadan 'HexT' Postma |
31 - 31 | +0 | 93.5 | 70.3% | 1.13 |
| Colby 'Walco' Walsh |
20 - 28 | -8 | 69.4 | 62.2% | 0.78 |
| Timothy 'autimatic' Ta |
19 - 29 | -10 | 65.0 | 62.2% | 0.77 |
| Vincent 'Brehze' Cayonte |
18 - 31 | -13 | 63.2 | 54.1% | 0.74 |
| Josh 'oSee' Ohm |
16 - 27 | -11 | 46.4 | 64.9% | 0.69 |
| Party Astronauts |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Justin 'FaNg' Coakley |
35 - 22 | +13 | 89.7 | 83.8% | 1.49 |
| Gage 'Infinite' Green |
28 - 18 | +10 | 84.8 | 78.4% | 1.35 |
| Adam 'WolfY' Andersson |
28 - 19 | +9 | 80.5 | 75.7% | 1.31 |
| Ben 'ben1337' Smith |
28 - 22 | +6 | 77.4 | 83.8% | 1.22 |
| Danny 'cxzi' Strzelczyk |
25 - 25 | +0 | 85.6 | 75.7% | 1.13 |
Finally, Nouns managed to stay alive in the competition thanks to a tight 2-1 victory over Elevate despite going down on the first map. While Elevate did pick Ancient to start off the content, the dominant fashion in which they won showed this would be a more difficult battle than anticipated. Nouns responded with their own strong showing on Nuke which they won 13-8 and then closed out their elimination match with a triumphant 13-6 in on Mirage.
NounsElevate| Nouns |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Paytyn 'junior' Johnson |
54 - 35 | +19 | 93.1 | 72.9% | 1.35 |
| Christopher 'cJ dA K1nG' Jones |
46 - 38 | +8 | 85.1 | 83.1% | 1.26 |
| Carson 'nosraC' O'Reilly |
36 - 40 | -4 | 67.1 | 69.5% | 1.00 |
| William 'RUSH' Wierzba |
36 - 40 | -4 | 64.6 | 69.5% | 0.99 |
| Jeorge 'Jeorge' Endicott |
24 - 36 | -12 | 58.6 | 79.7% | 0.88 |
| Elevate |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Derek 'dare' Brown |
44 - 43 | +1 | 86.1 | 79.7% | 1.19 |
 Deni 'dea' Ediev |
46 - 35 | +11 | 72.8 | 81.4% | 1.18 |
| Jaxon 'Peeping' Cornwell |
34 - 41 | -7 | 61.9 | 72.9% | 0.97 |
| Shane 'shane' Dressler |
29 - 38 | -9 | 63.8 | 67.8% | 0.92 |
| Wyatt 'snav' Phillippi |
32 - 40 | -8 | 54.1 | 67.8% | 0.83 |
There are three remaining matches in the competition, but only one for this Friday night: Nouns v. Party Astronauts. The winner of that will play Wildcard to decide the final spot at ESL Pro League Season 20.
Wildcard 
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