Triumph, Recon 5 headline teams through to second day of DreamHack Spring Series open qualifier
The first day of the DreamHack Masters Spring Series open qualifier has concluded, leaving only eight teams standing from the initial pool of 55.
Alan "Shakezullah" Hardeman had a triumphant debut with his new roster, featuring Rahul "curry" Nemani and Paytyn "Junior" Johnson, with the team comfortably working their way through the bracket. A first-round bye gave way to a pair of matches against XIII and Carrying Brian to an HLTV page, with the former team mustering five rounds and the latter managing just one before being dealt a swift defeat.
Meanwhile, two MDL teams found themselves sent packing early on, with Trivium falling in their first matchup against voLante and Swedish Canadians suffering a loss to MakeWarNotLove. Another upset came later in the bracket as Orion prevailed 16-14 over Yeah, eliminating the sole Brazilian team from the bracket, while another MDL team were eliminated as Alcoholics Anonymous were felled by recent promotees blood, sweat, and tears.
Another recently promoted team in the form of ETHEREAL found success of their own, taking down voLante to set up a clash against Triumph for a spot in the Closed Qualifier. At the bottom of the bracket, a new-look Recon 5 that featured Jason "neptune" Tran and Jet "jet-" Gao made short work of their opposition, pushing through to meet blood, sweat, and tears in the quarterfinals.
All four quarterfinal matches will commence at 6 PM EDT tomorrow, with the winners earning spots in the Closed Qualifier. The matchups are as follows:
 Triumph |
vs. | ETHEREAL |
| PDHM |
vs. | Monstars |
| New England Whalers |
vs. | Orion |
| Recon 5 |
vs. |  blood, sweat, and tears |
The four teams that move on to the Closed Qualifier will meet the invited sides of Cloud9, Swole Patrol, Bad News Bears, and Envy in a double-elimination, best-of-three bracket, with the top two teams moving on to the main event.
