ELEAGUE Major Playoffs Preview
The final stage of the ELEAGUE Boston Major is upon us, and we have prepared a preview of the playoff bracket that will begin tomorrow. Featuring many of the best teams in the world, there will certainly be some very close and exciting series to experience over the weekend.
FaZe vs mousesports
The first quarterfinal match in the playoffs of the ELEAGUE Boston Major will be a rematch of the ECS Season 4 Grand Final between international European squads FaZe and mousesports. With a combined five top 20 players from 2017 on the two rosters, there is an incredible amount of skill to go around.
On the FaZe side, Nikola "NiKo" Kovač will play in his first Major playoffs, while Olof "olofmeister" Kajbjer will play in his 12th. Every player on mousesports will play in their first Major playoff, with Chris "chrisJ" de Jong having the longest streak of former failure on the team with seven attendances in a row.
It isn’t clear if mouseports will be able to match their performance from Cancun last year, especially with NiKo, Håvard "rain" Nygaard, and Ladislav "GuardiaN" Kovács looking as dangerous as ever. It will be tough for Tomáš "oskar" Šťastný, Robin "ropz" Kool, and Miikka "suNny" Kemppi to match the firepower of the aforementioned trio, and combined with their inexperience on a stage with this much pressure, it’s hard to see mousesports overcoming the juggernaut of FaZe.
Natus Vincere vs 
Quantum Bellator Fire
This match contains probably the biggest story of the tournament in Quantum Bellator Fire. Featuring five Major rookies and the first Lithuanian player to attend a Major, this team surprised everyone by even qualifying for the event in the first place. In my CIS Minor Preview, I had put this team’s chances of making the playoffs of the Minor at not great, and they had already surprised by making the final against AVANGAR.
Over their Qualifier + Major run so far, the team leaders in stats have been Kirill "Boombl4" Mikhailov and Nikita "waterfaLLZ" Matveyev, the two newest members of the team. Whether they can compete against Na`Vi, who have Major winner Danylo "Zeus" Teslenko and Major finalists Aleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev and Ioann "Edward" Sukhariev, is questionable, although they did mount an admirable comeback against mousesports.
Throughout the Qualifier and Major, Na`Vi have steadily improved, and with the absurd amount of firepower in s1mple and Denis "electronic" Sharipov, the Ukrainian side should have the series on lock. Considering the things QB Fire have done so far however, it would be best for Zeus and his men to be wary and put in the preparation against a dangerous opponent.
G2 vs 
Cloud9
These two squads have acquired a sort of history of meeting each other in tournaments, and these two specific lineups have met twice on LAN. The first was at the ELEAGUE Premier, where Cloud9 came out on top 2-0, while the other was at this Major where G2 won on Cache. Overall looking at 3/5 for both rosters, Cloud9 actually comes out on top 7-6 in maps.
Other stories going into this matchup are that two of the longest streaks of failing to make the playoffs have been broken in Richard "shox" Papillon and Tyler "Skadoodle" Latham. Previous to Boston, shox had not made a Major playoff since ESL One Katowice 2015 while Skadoodle had never appeared in one after eight attempts.
The former EnVyUs core also hasn’t made the playoffs of a Major since the last time they won at DreamHack Cluj-Napoca 2015, while Alexandre "bodyy" Pianaro will enter his first. On the Cloud9 side, Tarik "tarik" Celik is the only player to have made the playoffs before, which occurred at MLG Columbus 2016 with CLG.
The winner of this match will be hard to call, since how both squads will play on any given day is not always certain, but based on form at this event so far, G2 look very scary. The French team has yet to drop a map in any stage so far, and have two of the highest rated players in Nathan "NBK-" Schmitt and Kenny "kennyS" Schrub. tarik has a large task going into C9’s match on Friday.
SK vs 
Fnatic
The final quarterfinal matchup is one that is likely closer than it appears. SK, who have been using their former member João "felps" Vasconcellos due to roster restrictions, have looked strong, but certainly not invincible, as every one of their games have gone to 26 or more rounds. Fnatic have also looked much stronger as of recent, taking down Astralis, Gambit, and Virtus.pro on their way to the playoffs. They have also made top four at their two previous events, and taken a map off of FaZe.
Every player on SK has made the playoffs of every Major they’ve attended. Freddy "KRIMZ" Johansson is one of the two remaining players to make the playoffs of all 12 Majors, while Jesper "JW" Wecksell and Robin "flusha" Rönnquist have made 11. As a Major rookie, Maikil "Golden" Selim will play in his first Major playoff as well.
KRIMZ has played absolutely outstanding so far at this event, and currently the third highest overall rating - an absurd 1.50. When it comes to series play however, Fnatic will have a tough time against the map pool of SK, and will probably need to rely on big performances from KRIMZ and flusha to give them a shot at advancing.
The first match of FaZe vs mousesports will begin at 8:00 AM EST tomorrow. The first three quarter finals will be played Friday, while the fourth match will be played on Saturday before the semi finals.
