Ah, where were we? Eight teams entered the ring, but only one came out victorious. Who fell, and who made their Major swell? Find out in this article as we sum up the final days of the Copenhagen PGL Major 2024.

Quarter-Finals

Spirit vs. FaZe

A match that some probably picked as the final in their Pick’ems, and our team was no different. With many believing that Spirit would go on and win their first Major, Finn “karrigan” Andersen turned the tide with a surprising map veto that included Vertigo, a map FaZe wasn’t known for, as the decider. The gamble paid off as after a masterclass on Mirage, Spirit tied the game in OT on Nuke, before failing to win against FaZe in OT on the surprise that was Vertigo.

MOUZ vs. G2

The other 3-0 team in MOUZ also faced a better team than expected in G2, and similarly to Spirit, these young bucks didn’t live up to the hype. While MOUZ looked poised to win their first Major just a week ago, they were stomped by the experienced G2, courtesy of some excellent calling from hometown hero Rasmus “HooXi” Nielsen. A quick 2-0 saw MOUZ looking completely toothless, taking G2 to the semis.

Vitality vs. Cloud9

After battling through illness, Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut was looking to defend his Major trophy as he faced off against the upstart Cloud9 in a pretty one-sided affair. With a 13:8 win on Inferno and a stomping on Anubis, Vitality easily ended any chances of a CIS Major win.

Eternal Fire vs. NAVI

Eternal Fire was the last single-nation squad remaining as they faced off against the Aleksi “Aleksib” Virolainen-led international roster. And unfortunately, it didn’t go three maps either. After an overtime thriller on Mirage, Eternal Fire couldn’t recover and fell 13:9 on their map pick of Inferno.

The Semis

As we went into the semis, one thing was for sure, an international roster would win it all. Which one, though?

NAVI vs. G2

It’s Aleksib against his former team in a rematch of the previous stage. Not a good omen for Nikola “NiKo” Kovacs and co, as NAVI defeated G2 13-11 during the first day of Eliminations in this tournament. The first map was G2’s pick of Anubis, and this sandy affair went all the way to Overtime, where NAVI managed to win their opponent’s map pick. G2 answered in kind on Nuke. The match moved to Ancient where G2 seemed to be gaining the upper hand until a wicked 3v5 ace from Justinas ‘jL’ Lekavicius prompted a NAVI resurgence on their CT side that eventually tipped the scale in a 13:11 win that kept Aleksib’s wicked streak alive.

FaZe vs. Vitality

Karrigan strikes again, leaving Vertigo on the board for Vitality, and in classic FaZe style, this one went the distance as well. FaZe first took Nuke, before the (half) French outfit countered on Vertigo, leaving us on Inferno, our old friend, where a concerted FaZe team effort saw them head to the grand final in karrigan’s hometown.

The Final: FaZe vs. NAVI

We’re finally here. The last match. After a year of waiting, the first CS2 Major Champion will be crowned. FaZe overcame trouble and a 3:2 start, while Na’Vi fought and defeated both underdogs and tournament favorites.

The veto saw another karrigan surprise, as he picked Ancient over Nuke, while Aleksi showed no fear, picking Mirage. Inferno became the final map in this BO3 and we were off to the races.

Ancient didn’t quite go according to karrigan’s plan, with NAVI eking out a narrow 13:9 win in a back-and-forth affair. However, Aleksi’s plan didn’t work either as FaZe smashed his team 13:2 in the Maghreb.

We headed to Inferno, where NAVI shook off their embarrassment and turned the map into hell for karrigan, who at one point was 0-12. NAVI took out their fellow one-time champs 13:2 and took the first Major Championship in CS2.

A great achievement for a roster that was previously considered a failure after Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev left last year, and a crowning achievement for Aleksib’s IGL legacy.

Did you predict this result? Well, we know you didn’t, as the top player in Major Madness scored 9/15 points en route to a free Gungnir! By the way, nobody in our team saw it coming either, but a few folks did predict a FaZe 2nd place finish.

What’s next? The top teams are heading to Chengdu, where they’ll compete for a $100,000 prize. Stay tuned!