The group stage at the ESL Pro League Season Six Finals has concluded. While the top team in Group B shouldn’t come as a surprise, some of the other results were definitely unexpected.
After going 1-1 on Tuesday, SK bounced back today and rolled over Ninjas in Pyjamas, NRG Esports, and Misfits. Their 4-1 record put them at the top of Group B. OpTic Gaming followed up the Brazilian squad in the group standings with a 3-2 record, while Misfits surprised many by finishing in the third spot—above NRG, NiP, and North.
Today’s games were relatively easy for the defending BLAST Pro Series champions. The first match against NiP on Overpass saw every SK player finish with over a 1.00 rating, while only one NiP player, Fredrik “REZ” Sterner, finished above a 1.00. The following game against NRG was nearly identical to the NiP game, as SK rolled over the NA team with a final score of 16-9. And the final match of the day was a rather quick 16-7 on Cache against Misfits to complete a perfect day two.
Despite SK’s performance, it wasn’t unexpected in the least. What was unexpected was the disappearance of NiP and especially North, a team playing in their home country of Denmark for this event. North’s sole win was a 16-11 victory against OpTic on Overpass. Valdemar “valde” Bjørn VangsÃ¥ was the standout player in that win, finishing with a 27-12 scoreline.
While NiP and North faded, Misfits and OpTic stood up and took the second and third places in Group B. OpTic’s practice definitely yielded great results as the team stood strong on every map that they played, with their only loss coming in a 30-round dogfight against NiP on Tuesday. The team even handed SK their only loss of the group stage with a 16-14 result on Mirage.
Misfits, led by former Cloud9 player Sean Gares, took the final Group B playoff spot after taking out each of the three bottom teams in the group. The team’s 2-1 record Tuesday put them in a good spot to clinch a playoff berth, but the team didn’t lock it in until today when they defeated NiP Gaming 16-13 on Overpass for their third win of the group stage.
Due to grabbing the top seed in the group, SK has a bye for the first round of the playoffs. They will play the winner of HellRaisers vs. Misfits, which will be played at 1:50pm ET on Dec. 8. And in the other first-round matchup, OpTic and Fnatic will face off at 10am ET on the same day to determine who will face Group A top seed, FaZe Clan.
