CS_Summit 5 Recap, BLAST Pro Finals – CSGO Recap 12/16/2019
Welcome back everyone to another exciting day of CSGO news. Today we’ve got a look at Astralis’ win at the Blast Pro Finals, Mouz’s win at CS_Summit 5, and a recap of the event.
As always, we’ve got a lot to cover today, so let’s dive on in.
Blast Pro Finals
After a closely fought year of play, Astralis has walked away as the winner of the 2019 Blast Pro Series after defeating Team Liquid in the tournament’s grand final after going undefeated at the event.
Following Team Liquid’s second-place finish was NiP in third place, and FaZe bringing up in the rear in fourth with a single map win to their name.
The victory for Astralis puts a cap on a year that has been marked with the controversy surrounding their forced participation and shared ownership with the Blast Pro Series by RFRSH, as well as concerns that the tournaments were making an already crowded circuit even busier for already overworked teams such as themselves. RFRSH has, however, received praise for its highly professional and well-designed streams and graphics, setting a new standard for tournament production.
While the tournament series is getting renamed to the Blast Premier series for next year, we can expect a continuation of the high-quality broadcasts we’ve come to know from them.
Mouz Wins CS_Summit 5 and Recap
While Astralis was busy capping off their year in style, Mousesports was pushing for their third-straight tournament victory at CS_Summit 5 in Los Angeles.
Mouz, who had won the EPL Finals last weekend and the CSGO Asia Championship several weeks prior, got off to a shaky start after going 2-2-1 (wins-draws-losses) in the tournament group stage and losing the first map of Mirage to OG in the semifinals.
Any doubts about the team’s strength were quickly put to rest, however, as they proceeded to thrash OG 16-5 on Inferno before closing it out 16-12 on Dust II.
On the other side of the bracket, G2 Esports fought off a Vertigo win by Virtus.Pro to take the series 2-1 after a rousing match on Nuke that saw G2 win 16-7, and a closer but still strong 16-12 finish on Train, punching their ticket to a tournament grand final for the first time since GGL in July.
The final started out with an exciting 19-17 OT win on Mirage by Mouz before G2 came back and slapped them on Vertigo, winning the map with a shocking 16-1 scoreline.
With Mouz playing both that map and Train without Karrigan due to travel issues, and Woxic out for the event due to visa problems, it seemed like G2 would finally get their win after two months of middling results.
It wasn’t to be, however, as Mouz, led by stand-in NaToSaphiX and coach Ropz as subs, came back from a 5-10 deficit at the half to win the final map Train 16-14 and secure their third straight tournament win.
They doubted him, but he stepped up when it mattered the most! @RejinCS showed last night that he is more than "just" our coach ?#ReadyWillingAble
— mousesports (@mousesports) December 16, 2019
?BTS pic.twitter.com/tl77AL3gUL
Given the team was handicapped without two of their big starters, it’s incredible they were able to win the tournament, and many are expecting big things from them going into next year.
G2, meanwhile, has one again thrown away what should be an easy match win, calling into question whether or not this roster really has what it takes to be a top team.
Both OG and Virtus.Pro, who took third-fourth at the event, both had good showings given their new line-ups, and leave CS Summit with a good amount more experience before the Major qualifier season starts.
FURIA and MIBR, however, continue the struggles they’ve had for a couple of months now, finding issues keeping consistent. Both teams have shown tremendous talent and the ability to take on top-tier teams blow for blow, but whether or not they can hold that form for a period of time remains to be seen.
That’s all we have for today, thanks for reading. We’ll be back later this week with more exciting CSGO news, so stay tuned!
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