MIBR MIBR Brazil Rank #7 artzin Arthur Araujo xenom Eduardo Soeiro cortezia Gabriel Cortez nzr Agustin Ibarra aspas Erick Santos has defeated Cloud9 Cloud9 North America Rank #9 Xeppaa Erick Bach v1c Victor Truong mitch Mitch Semago neT Michael Bernet OXY Francis Hoang in the second elimination series of Kickoff Americas. Following their 2-1 win, the Brazilian squad will next play against Evil Geniuses Evil Geniuses North America Rank #21 Derrek Derrek Ha NaturE Nicholas Garrison supamen Phat Le icy Jacob Lange yay Jaccob Whiteaker , as the teams look to remain in the lower bracket and fight for a spot at 2025's first international event.

Cloud9 opened Lotus with an early attacking lead, winning the pistol and going up 4-0. MIBR answered with a recovered economy to tie the scoreline. Cloud9's strong Tejo-based post-plant and identifying MIBR's weaker C site let them take the lead, but MIBR adapted with a well-executed flank through the attacker spawn. The first map went to the break at 6-6, with no team at an advantage.

Cloud9 lead MIBR straight into OXY

C9 found another bonus win after taking the pistol round, and MIBR was unable to find a way back into the second half. Statistically, OXY and v1c completely took over Lotus, with a combined 45 eliminations and a 1.78 rating on attack for v1c and 2.58 rating on defense for OXY. The map ended 13-7 after mitch cleaned up the anti-eco, with MIBR only getting one point on the offense.

MIBR mirrored their opponents to begin their map, Abyss. They took the pistol round and secured the bonus, forcing C9 onto a low buy. A tactical timeout from the North American lineup set them up for a flawless round, and a later ace and 1v3 from OXY gave them a second point, but MIBR continued extending their lead on attack.

MIBR perfectly countered C9's mid-A split

Cloud9 answered back on their own offense. They won the fourth pistol-bonus round string of the series, with OXY's performance and a couple of neT 1vXs keeping them in the series. A combination of an MIBR timeout and aspas taking up the Operator helped them return to the series, and the Brazilian team won Abyss 13-10.

“There's no way to not be happy with the best player in the world on my team,” fRoD said regarding aspas after their series. “He is growing a lot as a leader, as someone the new players look up to” he added.

The decider map, Pearl, began with an early lead from Cloud9. MIBR had the advantage multiple rounds on attack, but took until round 4 to put themselves up on the scoreboard. xenom helped his team tie the scoreline, and MIBR ran away with the attack the rest of the half, going to the break at 8-4.

artzin wins these.

MIBR continued extending their lead after taking the pistol round. C9 took the bonus round, but the Bucky made an appearance, with artzin getting a 4K on an eco. Cloud9 won an additional round on B, leading to MIBR's tactical pause. The pressure mounting on the North American team was apparent, as they gave away multiple kills to MIBR to grant them series point. C9 called for their own timeout ahead of an eco round, but aspas held strong, stalling the plant long enough for xenom and artzin to win the match 13-7.

The victory sets MIBR up against 2023 Champions Evil Geniuses, with the teams hoping to begin a lower bracket run, earn Championship points, and qualify to Masters: Bangkok. Cloud9 is now eliminated from contention, and will need to wait until Stage 1 to return to the server.

“They're a pretty good team, but we are confident to play against them,” artzin said regarding EG.

Kickoff will continue on January 24: