Nigma Galaxy lifted the ESL Impact League Season 1 Finals trophy in Dallas, Texas, after taking out FURIA fe in a three-map series which ended up with the European squad taking home the $50,000 lion’s share of the prize pool over their Brazilian rivals to put an end to three days of LAN play.
Before the grand final Nigma Galaxy kicked off their playoff run with a victory over BIG EQUIPA in a 2-1 series. The Russian-majority squad started the match going down 0-1, losing the Iberian team’s pick of Ancient, before taking it in two one-sided maps, Inferno and Overpass.
FURIA fe on the other hand started off on the wrong foot by giving up their Vertigo pick 3-16 and going down 10-14 on Mirage, CLG Red‘s pick, but then the Brazilians rallied and went on to win the map in overtime to force a third map, Dust2. There, Karina “kaah” Takahashi and company crushed the North Americans 15-0 on the attack before punching their ticket to the grand final 16-2.
Nigma Galaxy’s next stop will be ESL Impact Valencia in July
The final match of the tournament kicked off on Mirage, FURIA fe’s pick, where they proved to be the superior side on the attack by taking the half 9-6. Nigma Galaxy didn’t let up, however, and brought it back on their own terrorist side, leading 12-10 heading into the final stages of the map before the Brazilians, with Mariana “mari” Preste and Olga “Olga” Rodrigues at the helm, turned things around in-extremis to win their pick in the thirtieth round.
Veteran Ksenia “vilga” Kluenkova then charged through on the T side of Vertigo with 20 kills before the switch to get her team ahead 11-4. On the CT side Nigma Galaxy took charge and closed out the map without a hitch, 16-5, to push the series to the decider map.
The series came down to Overpass, the map that the two teams played in their group stage bout, which went the way of the Europeans in an overtime nailbiter. Nigma Galaxy, on the CT side, were quick to impose their will and go on a tear to close the half 14-1. FURIA fe started to creep back into the map off the back of a pistol round win, but were stopped early as a quad-kill by Alexandra “twenty3” Timonina got her team to match point, after which Nigma Galaxy converted 16-7 to win the event in Dallas and hoist the trophy.
The ESL Impact League Season 1 Finals standings are:
1.
2.
3-4.CLG Red – $13,000
3-4.BIG EQUIPA – $13,000
5-6.
5-6.
7-8.ATK fe – $4,000
7-8.Mindfreak – $4,000
The next stop for many of the teams that competed in Dallas, including the four playoff squads, will be ESL Impact Valencia, where an eight-team women’s tournament with $100,000 on the line will take place at the DreamHack festival in Spain.
