Infamous and iNTACT top final ECS Season 7 Challenger Cup qualifier
The final ECS Season 7 Challenger Cup qualifier has concluded, seeing iNTACT and Infamous claim the last two slots to join Ghost, The Quest, Mythic, Party Astronauts, Zone, and MASSIVEimpact on the team list.
The first of the two teams to earn their Challenger Cup berth was Infamous, who went up against Cyclone in the only quarterfinal matchup to go to a third map. Maxim "wippie" Shepelev, who was standing in for Dylan "RIKO" Sabin-Arnce, powered his side to a win on the first map of Mirage, with Infamous initially trailing 7-8 at the half before making a dominant resurgence on their T side to take a 16-11 win. wippie ended the first map boasting a 1.86 rating, averaging 117 damage per round and dropping 31 frags to help net his team the win.
Rafael "clone" Singer and Erik "bul" Penny combined on the second map of Inferno to crush Infamous in the first half, putting up 11 rounds on their T side to give themselves a good shot at taking the series to a third map. Infamous attempted a comeback, with the two teams trading rounds back-and-forth before Infamous took control by winning five rounds straight. Cyclone managed to put a halt to wippie and co.'s streak just in time, closing out Inferno 16-13 and moving to the decider of Train.
Once again Cyclone opened up the first half of Train in firm control, mustering 10 T side rounds and leaving Infamous trailing at the half. wippie continued to step up for his team, helping to rally a comeback as Infamous took three rounds for each single one that Cyclone put up in the second half to fight for a 16-14 map win. wippie grabbed himself another 35 kills over the map, ending the series with a total of 87 frags for a +34 K-D.
InfamousCyclone| Infamous |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Maxim 'wippie' Shepelev |
87 - 53 | +34 | 102.8 | 80.2% | 1.56 |
 Erick 'Xeppaa' Bach |
62 - 57 | +5 | 84.6 | 80.2% | 1.19 |
| Mike 'real_bM' Desanto |
58 - 56 | +2 | 72.7 | 75.6% | 1.07 |
| Josh 'JoshRT' Lee |
60 - 61 | -1 | 73.8 | 68.6% | 1.06 |
| Brendan 'Bwills' Williams |
48 - 52 | -4 | 64.4 | 72.1% | 0.98 |
| Cyclone |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Erik 'penny' Penny |
76 - 66 | +10 | 95.6 | 67.4% | 1.29 |
| Rafael 'clone' Singer |
61 - 58 | +3 | 67.7 | 72.1% | 1.00 |
| Derek 'dVeeN' Vander Veen |
55 - 57 | -2 | 65.5 | 69.8% | 0.99 |
| Adrian 'recky' Golec |
50 - 65 | -15 | 66.7 | 66.3% | 0.87 |
| Matt 'Afghan' Chilinski |
37 - 69 | -32 | 60.3 | 61.6% | 0.75 |
With their quarterfinal win, Infamous were supposed to go up against SODMG in a semifinal matchup to advance. With SODMG having defeated Farmers 2-0 on Inferno and Cache with dominant opening halves, the matchup could've been interesting; however, SODMG failed to show up in the match room for the semifinals and thus forfeited their match against Infamous, granting wippie's side a free path to the Challenger Cup.
FarmersSODMG| Farmers |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Adam 'AdamJW' Weil |
45 - 39 | +6 | 101.6 | 64.7% | 1.23 |
| Nassir 'rugrat' Francique |
36 - 40 | -4 | 82.6 | 72.5% | 1.03 |
| Mario 'MARIO' Wakim |
28 - 42 | -14 | 60.0 | 62.7% | 0.75 |
| Max 'Assailant' Gallagher |
27 - 43 | -16 | 53.1 | 51.0% | 0.65 |
| Tyler 'TheDudeAbides' Statia |
21 - 43 | -22 | 48.0 | 47.1% | 0.51 |
| SODMG |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nick 'peanut' Himber |
47 - 25 | +22 | 92.7 | 84.3% | 1.51 |
| Eric 'ERIC' W. |
46 - 37 | +9 | 91.7 | 82.4% | 1.42 |
| Carson 'nosraC' O'Reilly |
49 - 31 | +18 | 97.1 | 80.4% | 1.40 |
| Ryan 'wrsrule' Hatcher |
41 - 34 | +7 | 84.4 | 80.4% | 1.27 |
| Noah 'insane' Eheart |
23 - 30 | -7 | 59.5 | 74.5% | 0.91 |
iNTACT had to fight through the heavier side of the bracket, with their initial quarterfinal matchup pairing them against the new-look Big Frames lineup.
Also read: Stay Frosty unable to beat the heat as agM and DaneJoris look for team, Nurfed steps downThe trio of Christopher "Swahn" Swahn, Alan "Shakezullah" Hardeman, and Gabe "Spongey" Greiner combined for a 2-0 series win, asserting their dominance on Inferno 16-6 before rallying back from a 6-9 deficit on Nuke for a 16-11 map win. Swahn ended the series with a 1.71 rating, although the trio of players above contributed in the fragging department across the two maps that were played.
Big FramesiNTACT| Big Frames |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thomas 'tconnors' Connors |
37 - 40 | -3 | 80.0 | 69.4% | 1.11 |
| Liam 'Welshy' Newhouse |
30 - 39 | -9 | 65.6 | 51.0% | 0.84 |
| Andy 'devastation' Parr |
25 - 41 | -16 | 57.5 | 61.2% | 0.73 |
| Ryan 'Church' Church |
27 - 42 | -15 | 61.4 | 59.2% | 0.67 |
| Jimmy 'Nurfed' McFadden |
14 - 40 | -26 | 44.7 | 49.0% | 0.47 |
| iNTACT |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Christopher 'Swahn' Swahn |
50 - 22 | +28 | 96.9 | 89.8% | 1.71 |
| Alan 'Shakezullah' Hardeman |
46 - 25 | +21 | 92.7 | 85.7% | 1.48 |
| Gabe 'Spongey' Greiner |
41 - 28 | +13 | 84.3 | 83.7% | 1.31 |
| William 'will' Cheng |
36 - 29 | +7 | 85.8 | 87.8% | 1.21 |
| Jake 'kaboose' McDonald |
29 - 29 | +0 | 71.9 | 77.6% | 1.11 |
Koby "kobruh" Higgs' mix team, consisting of himself and a selection of Forty Six and 2 players, met iNTACT in the semifinal after dispatching of the ESEA Main roster of lets go bowlin 2-0 (16-10 Dust2, 16-6 Train) in their own quarterfinal matchup.
Spongey and Swahn continued to put up numbers for their side in the semifinals, granting iNTACT a 12-3 lead on the CT side of Mirage to kick off their series against Kobruh. Although iNTACT lost the second half pistol, they were able to immediately reply back with a trio of rounds to gain match point. Shakezullah's side struggled to close out the map as Kobruh managed to win eight more rounds, but the win finally went their way 16-12 to take the series to Overpass.
The second map saw the two teams trade rounds back and forth in both halves, with neither team managing to string more than a set of rounds together. iNTACT won three rounds straight at the end of the first half, but that was the only occurrence of more than two rounds in a row going the way of either team. A neck-and-neck battle saw iNTACT narrowly edge out an 8-7 lead at the end of their T side, eventually closing out the map 16-14 following a number of back-and-forths between the two sides in the second half.
iNTACTKobruh| iNTACT |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gabe 'Spongey' Greiner |
49 - 36 | +13 | 98.3 | 81.0% | 1.41 |
| Christopher 'Swahn' Swahn |
51 - 34 | +17 | 84.9 | 77.6% | 1.40 |
| William 'will' Cheng |
49 - 43 | +6 | 80.6 | 72.4% | 1.18 |
| Jake 'kaboose' McDonald |
35 - 40 | -5 | 68.9 | 67.2% | 1.00 |
| Alan 'Shakezullah' Hardeman |
32 - 35 | -3 | 67.2 | 67.2% | 0.95 |
| Kobruh |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Francisco 'k1Nky' Alvarez |
49 - 43 | +6 | 89.9 | 75.9% | 1.18 |
| Koby 'kobruh' Higgs |
39 - 43 | -4 | 80.3 | 56.9% | 1.07 |
| David 'spaydeR' Esquerra |
41 - 45 | -4 | 72.8 | 72.4% | 0.99 |
| Adrian 'Gonnak' Arguello |
41 - 42 | -1 | 82.3 | 63.8% | 0.94 |
| Jose 'SecretAgent' Fernandez |
17 - 44 | -27 | 44.0 | 55.2% | 0.54 |
With iNTACT and Infamous moving on to the Challenger Cup, the eight qualified teams are:
| MASSIVEimpact |
Zone |
| Mythic |
Party Astronauts |
| Ghost |
The Quest |
| Infamous |
iNTACT |
The ECS Season 7 Challenger Cup will run from March 5 - 7, with eight invited teams set to be announced in the near future. Dates and more details on any qualifier can be found on the Dust2.us Calendar.
