Fluxo defeat Sharks to become three-time CCT South America champions

Fluxo edged out Sharks to reign supreme in CCT South America Series 3 when they completed a reverse sweep after losing their map pick. They stumbled on Dust2 (11-16) at the start, answered back with a statement victory on Vertigo (16-4), and finally eked out the win with a hard-fought victory on Mirage (16-13).

Fluxo‘s first-place finish in the competition awards the side 150 points on the Champion of Champions regional ranking leaderboard as well as the $11,000 cash prize. They previously won a one-sided grand final versus paiN in the inaugural CCT South America tournament before repeating this feat in the second iteration versus Paquetá.

The Brazilian ensemble now sits atop the South America ladder with 450 points after winning the tournament for the third time in a row, which locked them into one of the three spots at an upcoming studio LAN finals.

Adriano “⁠WOOD7⁠” Cerato and company accepted an invite to start their run through the $25,000 event from the playoff stage and their campaign up until the grand final was relatively straightforward. They dispatched Paquetá and Isurus in two-map series to start off before overpowering FUSION 2-1 in the semi-finals.

The matchup between Fluxo and Sharks didn’t come without controversy, however. A scheduling conflict with the ESL Brazil Premier League, which offers a sole spot for ESL Pro League Season 17 Conference, forced Fluxo to attempt to postpone the CCT South America grand final game until Thursday.

In a thread on Twitter prior to the start of the game, WOOD7 stated that CCT had threatened to withdraw Fluxo‘s 300 league points, which they attained for their previous two-time first-place finishes, as well as any prize pool money should they refuse to play their final series versus Sharks. This ultimately led to Fluxo forfeiting their ESL Brazil Premier League skirmish versus ODDIK, hampering the team’s chances at claiming an ESL Pro League Season 17 Conference berth.

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The grand final eventually began on Dust2, Fluxo‘s map pick, although Sharks struck first, denying Fluxo a late comeback attempt to punish their foes’ map pick, 16-11, and go 1-0 up in the series. Fluxo sought revenge at the onset of map two and quickly punished their opponents’ Vertigo choice by storming ahead and closing the map out 16-4 to force a Mirage decider.

Fluxo remained in the driver’s seat once Mirage rolled around. High fragging output from Vinicius “⁠vsm⁠” Moreira and Lucas “⁠Lucaozy⁠” Neves, who combined for 48 kills by the map’s end, enabled the side to snatch away the map 16-13 and the series 2-1, which earned the Brazilian quintet a hat-trick of CCT South America tournament wins in the process.

There remains just one more CCT South America event left to play, the playoffs of which will begin on February 6. Teams that clinch a podium finish by the conclusion of all four online cups will secure an invite to the yet-to-be-announced studio finals.