dgt: “I’m living the best days of my life right now, I never experienced anything like this”

9z bounced back from a rough start at the IEM Rio Major by joining the 2-1 pool in the Challengers Stage Swiss group. Their 6-16 opening loss to GamerLegion was followed up with a 16-11 victory against hometown favorites Imperial on the first day of play. The South American squad is now positive after their third best-of-one, a 19-17 overtime affair against Evil Geniuses, which sets them up with two chances to tournament’s Legends Stage.

Franco “⁠dgt⁠” Garcia sat down with HLTV to talk about 9z‘s run at the Major and what the experience is like for a team playing their first event with a crowd. “It’s an energy that we never lived before so we had to learn how to control it,” the Uruguayan rifler said in the interview below. The 21-year-old also spoke about his squad’s growth and the matches they’ve played so far in Rio, as well as their mindset moving forward. “What better tournament to enjoy ourselves than this one?” He asked, rhetorically. “It’s our first event with a crowd.”

Let’s start by talking about your journey at the Major so far. You got here and played the first match on stage against GamerLegion with a pretty packed house. It didn’t go that well for you, though. Were there some nerves?

Personally, I wasn’t nervous, but you can definitely feel a difference with the crowd, it’s an energy that we never lived before so we had to learn how to control it and that hurt us in our first match. GamerLegion were into it really quickly and they didn’t give us a chance to get confident. They punished us a lot and we couldn’t adapt to the game, they’ve been playing really well and we just couldn’t do anything about it.

Then we played the second match against Imperial and it was the same feeling but times a thousand. It’s a beautiful energy and we spent all day here, so we were more adapted to it, to what we were going to feel during the match. The crowd was against us, but it was also nice because it gives you extra energy to make an even bigger effort. I’m not going to become smaller because they’re cheering against me, I’m going to become bigger and show that I’m also big.

So playing against the crowd helped?

Yeah, we talked about how we wanted to play Imperial in front of their crowd before the Major. When we said that, we couldn’t even imagine what it ended up being like and how much they shouted. The crowd also helped them in some rounds, they got some kills from hearing the crowd, but I’m just living the best days of my life right now, I never experienced anything like this.

You came into the second day with a 1-1 record and went up against Evil Geniuses. You played them at the RMR [and lost], but this time you went into Nuke, which you didn’t play then. Did you see yourselves as favorites?

The truth is that I didn’t think we were favorites, but I was confident that we were going to win. We were waiting to see if we’d have to play Vitality or EG and when we saw that it was EG it gave us some peace of mind because it was our chance to beat them. They beat us the last time, but we’ve gotten better since the RMR.

I felt really prepared, even though some rounds got a bit complicated and they won a lot of T rounds because we messed up some smokes and we let them get too much information in the outside area, so they rotated well. When it was 14-15 and I won the 1vs1, that was the moment that I said, ‘OK, we’re going to win now, we came back from 5-10 and we’re not going to lose.’

You’re going into series play now. How do you see yourselves heading into that part of the Challengers Stage, what shape is the team in?

We’re doing good, but we need to control ourselves even more, regarding being calm and so on because we lose some rounds because of that. The team is in a good place, we can beat anyone, but we also need to be playing our best game. It’s important for us to not feel pressure, we don’t have any expectations and just play to have fun and enjoy the game. What better tournament to enjoy ourselves than this one? It’s our first event with a crowd.

It’s also your second Major now, are you a bit more calm in that sense?

Yeah, before the first match I talked to max about how we were feeling more at ease, how we didn’t feel as many nerves or pressure. It was more like, ‘okay, this is just one more.’ When we got on stage and played the first match it wasn’t like that at all, it was completely different and we felt something we had never experienced before. We’ve always played studio events so having a crowd is completely different.

We’re getting that experience now and it’s helping us grow, so there was still a change from the past Major to this one. It’s like taking the next step, we went from being nervous at RMRs to not being nervous there anymore. We went from playing studio events with nerves, and the last Major, to not getting nervous at studios events anymore. Now we got a bit nervous in the first match with a crowd, or maybe not nervous but a bit anxious with a new energy, and now we’re adapting to it.

You say that playing with a crowd is very different. What were the first things you noticed about it?

It’s a little bit like what you always do, which is controlling emotions, but just on a whole other level. You have thousands of people shouting at you, like ‘AAAAAAAAAH,’ full of euphoria, but you can’t just get carried away. You have to control yourself. We also have some noise-canceling headsets that still let in quite a bit of noise, so that’s kind of the difference. Even if it doesn’t seem like much, it’s a lot, you look up and see 2000 people shouting against us when we faced Imperial, but then when we play against a team from another region they’re cheering for us, so it’s like… it’s not really pressure, but it’s definitely different than what we’re used to which is being completely calm.

You tweeted after the GamerLegion match that it was ‘very hard, very different.’ What did you mean, exactly?

The PC had some things that I hadn’t put on, like I had mouse acceleration for the first six rounds and I didn’t know why it felt so much more sensitive. Then the crowd shouting, of course, and the LAN ping. We play a lot of studio events, but they’re not always 100% LAN. You have like 5 ping, but it’s not the same, I don’t know how to explain. When you play completely on LAN the game is different. You move faster, all of the bullets are faster, every shot is perfect, and that makes the game change. I even felt like when I was peeking, I had an advantage, which is something that doesn’t happen otherwise. There’s a lot of little things that make the game change. When you get here without expecting that, it’s hard.

Are you used to it now, you’re more relaxed?

Yeah, I’m feeling good!