KRÜ win first match of their season in Americas Last Chance Qualfier

KRÜ Esports KRÜ Esports Latin America South Rank #2 keznit Angelo Mori Mazino Roberto Rivas adverso Benjamín Poblete Shyy Fabian Usnayo Melser Marco Eliot Machuca Amaro took down MIBR MIBR Brazil Rank #4 artzin Arthur Araujo xenom Eduardo Soeiro cortezia Gabriel Cortez nzr Agustin Ibarra aspas Erick Santos in the opening match of the VCT Americas Last Chance Qualifier. The LATAM team will advance to the upper bracket quarterfinals where they face off in a single-elimination match against FURIA FURIA Brazil Rank #6 heat Olavo Marcelo raafa Rafael Lima mwzera Leonardo Serrati havoc Ilan Eloy Khalil Khalil Schmidt for a chance to reach the double-elimination semifinals. Meanwhile, MIBR's season is officially over.

KRÜ and MIBR entered the match as the bottom two teams in the Americas League. KRÜ did not win a single match in the regular season. The team went 0-9, though they had several close, nail-biting matches. MIBR started off the season hot with wins against KRÜ and a slow-starting NRG Esports NRG Esports North America Rank #2 FiNESSE Pujan Mehta s0m Sam Oh brawk Brock Somerhalder mada Adam Pampuch Ethan Ethan Arnold but didn't win a single match afterward until their memorable upset against 100 Thieves 100 Thieves North America Rank #5 zander Alexander Dituri Cryocells Matthew Panganiban eeiu Daniel Vucenovic Boostio Kelden Pupello Asuna Peter Mazuryk , which their assistant coach substitute TxoziN .

All of KRÜ showed up to play on the first day of the LCQ. On both their own map pick Bind and MIBR's map pick Lotus, KRÜ completed the first half with dominant 9-3 finishes. The final scorelines were 13-7 and 13-8 respectively.

KRÜ Esports huddles onstage before competing (Photo by Tina Jo/Riot Games)

Both coach Atom and players Klaus and keznit spoke on how the more than one-and-a-half month-long break between the regular season and the LCQ helped them regain their confidence.

“I think the break was really nice to restart, to reset, and to go again," keznit said in his post-match interview. "We saw a lot of times where it was coming very close, but it was maybe a little bit of anxiety, just a little bit that was missing, and it was important to be able to come back.”

While on the desk, Klaus also mentioned that the KRÜ players had been talking to a psychologist over the break to help develop their mindset.

On Bind, old guards Klaus and keznit led the charge with 291 and 256 ACS finishes respectively. Klaus delivered the first ace of the series on KRÜ's bonus round, where he killed the spike planter with seven seconds on the clock and then cleaned up the rest of MIBR while dodging behind triple. He ended the first half of the map with a +10 differential.

After halftime, MIBR attempted to mount a comeback but found themselves down 12-5. However, not all hope was lost for the Brazillian team, as they managed to win two convincing gun rounds and cripple KRÜ's economy. But despite losing Melser and the spike in the early round, KRÜ pulled off a thrifty with just stingers and guardians to secure themselves the map win.

On Lotus, DaveeyS and Melser went positive with a +6 and +5 differential respectively. As Killjoy, DaveeyS silently wracked up six 2Ks on the map, the most of any player. But Klaus' explosiveness remained unmatched.

On round 13, Klaus won a tense 1v2 with an incredible collateral headshot onto RgLMeister and murizzz on a peak out from C Hall. Teammate Melser wasn't to be outdone though. He clutched his own Sheriff shot to secure a defuse on their bonus round and bring KRÜ to a 12-3 scoreline.

Despite KRÜ's lead, MIBR began to take consecutive rounds off the LATAM team and threaten a second-half comeback. But five was all MIBR would get. KRÜ found themselves in a 2v2 scenario on round 21. Then rgl took down DaveeyS, leaving NagZ in a 2v1 with the spike counting down. NagZet won the fight against rgl in stairs, bringing it down to a 1v1.

NagZet tapped once, trying to bait out jzz . He and jzz exchanged rifle shots. Low on ammo, NagZet switched to the Classic and brought the spike to half. jzz peeked. NagZet got off the spike and killed jzz with a pistol shot to the head, winning KRÜ their first series of the year.

This was not the same KRÜ who had experienced a devastating loss to Cloud9 Cloud9 North America Rank #6 Xeppaa Erick Bach v1c Victor Truong mitch Mitch Semago neT Michael Bernet OXY Francis Hoang on the very same map just months prior. They looked revitalized.

“We came here with the anger and everything we wanted to let off for the match,” said keznit. “And it was a match we needed to win at some point.”