With a $35,000 difference between first and second place, tomorrow’s Championship Gaming Invitational finals will provide 10 rounds of heart racing Counter-Strike. Friday’s opening match play featured two players out performing the field. For Complexity, team leader Corey “tr1p” Dodd was the team’s star as he posted a monster 121.1 DAR with 15 frags, 4 deaths, and 2 assists. 3D’s veteran Ron “Rambo” Kim lead his team to victory by posting 17 frags and three assists to only six deaths.

Expect the opening round of tomorrow’s CGI finals to provide a key to victory for both Complexity and Team 3D. The two teams went a combined 17-1 in their first halves during the first two matches -- each won the opening round. With the importance of winning the opening round solidified, the real question of how that opening round will be decided could be left up to a few factors. First, map selection. Second, side selection -- offense or defense.

Map selection for tomorrow’s finals will be narrowed by a couple of factors, namely the teams will not play the same map twice, so count Inferno and Dust2 out. Unconfirmed reports tell us that none of the fringe maps associated to competitive CS will be played, i.e., no Cbble, Fire, Aztec, etc. Expect it to come down to Train or Nuke.

Side selection will be determined by a coin flip which should happen a couple of hours before the match time, which is expected to commence some time after 4pm PST (7pm EST).

If Train is selected as tomorrow’s map, expect the two teams to come out with AWP’s. With potentially three players wielding AWP’s for either team it could be quite an AWP fest. If either team builds a solid advantage off of an opening round win, which is to be expected, those players would also be AWP threats.

Be on the look out for a battle on either map between the two team’s main AWP players, Griffin “Shaguar” Benger for Team 3D, and Danny “fRoD” Montaner for Complexity. Even if the players choose to avoid purchasing AWP’s in the opening round, the player on the opening round team winning team WILL get an AWP and needs to use it effectively to shut the door on a possible comeback.

Nuke could provide a more interesting dilemma. AWP play among both of these teams is less likely on Nuke while more aggressive ramp room and upper bombsite pushes could be expected. The play of Team 3D’s Dave “moto” Geffon will be a key for both teams. His aggressive style leads to either early pick offs for superior numbers for Team 3D, or early pick offs for Complexity. Moto will need to convert early frag opportunities in the ramp room for his team to be successful.

Watch for the early part of the game to dictate tempo. The losing team of the opening round will need to avoid getting over ran and sloppy in their early gun round chances. The losing team must play it conservatively and swing the momentum back as soon as possible. If the opening round winning team can run off four or five rounds in a row the match could end in a 10-3 or 10-4 score very easily.