Written by Bobby "weenus" Hicks



We've reached a little past the half point of the upper bracket and pretty much everything has been a New Years Eve Party Janitor's Closet blowout! The exceptions being TEC/begrip and ALT ATTAX/Astralis. Some predicted outcomes here, but one of the matches I've personally focused on was D!E versus SK.ger.

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D!E VS SK.ger

D!E had been taking serious fire from the entire community, claiming they couldn't handle European teams, and that they only placed 5th at CPL, because of their predominately American road to the top 10. SK.ger had been getting chased around like a girl at a LAN event but just about everyone looking for a reason why we can't see SK.swe get upset for the third tournament in a row. Between these two of these teams, we've had more naysayer's than gospel, so both had something to prove heading in.

Word has been traveling around that SK.ger had made a prediction for a 16-4 crushing match OVER D!E. The real results? 16-2, D!E. Now, most people in their right mind know that, rolling SK.ger isn't a huge accomplishment, but you're rolling the Kommando's name... in the least. Easily one of the longest accused players of the orgy of accusation victims representing D!E, Cuz, nearly dropped 30 kills in the first half alone. While a few of those were defuses, a fair share of them were flat out kills. Looking at the GameSense statistics, Cuz and kEEN ran the match with a total of 21 frags and 8 deaths each overall, however, Cuz had seven assists, and four of the five D!E players are wearing 4 kill round badges, opposite of SK.ger's badges, of Courage.

Important update: As of Press time, Bullseye has accumulated FIVE frags in the past 3 rounds for coL against mouz. More as time permits. These five kills all via an Ace round.

I caught up with Cuz immediately after he left the tournament area, and asked him a few brief questions about the match. Here's a brief transcript.

weenus: Cuz, you just got done beating SK.germany, what, 16-1?

CuZ: 16-2.

weenus: 16-2, and you about dropped a 3-bomb on them first half. Now, you couldn't really do anything on them second half because you guys only had 3 rounds. They predicted a 16-4 domination over you guys, what do you have to say about all of the German fans for SK.germany right now?

CuZ: (pause and laughing) Man... Everybody thinks Germany's overrated so we're just gonna have to put 'em down. They said they was gonna beat us but we proved them wrong... We let our game do the talkin' you know?

weenus: When you guys won did you just want to jump in the air and scream 'We just beat SK on LAN!!" Was that the first thing that went through your head or what were you thinking?

CuZ: Hell yea! You know what I mean? SK! They're sponsered by Intel, they helped us out a bit so, it feels good to beat them.

weenus: How is this, well, you guys placed 5th last time, hows it weighing over your head, especially going into international matches where people said you can only beat American teams, going into Begrip who is proving to be a pretty fierce competitor?

CuZ: We just gonna prove people wrong. Everybody thinks just cause we beat alot of American clans and then lost to the Number two European teams, that doesn't mean we suck, you know? We just have to prove people wrong.

weenus: Alright man well, goodjob, and good luck chasing that three bomb on the euro's.

CuZ: Fo sho weenus, know what I mean?!

Straight up gangsta.

ICMATCH=41

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Tec VS Begrip.swe

Another big match was the TEC/Begrip match, which ended up 16-14, Begrip. TEC put up a lot of big numbers, and, while yes they were the favorite going in, there was a lot of disappointed faces when they lost. Moses proved to be an asset to the TEC name, winning multiple outnumbered rounds, including a 4v1. t0ol also stopped a rush of four cold in its tracks by his lonesome. The real shining star of the match was Matt Gilbert himself, Gouki. He won, quite possibly his first clutch round in CPL history, a 3v1, to the appeal of all five of his screaming fans standing over his narrow shoulders. I had conducted a post match interview with Gouki, but, he pleaded with me not to use it, so I won't out of respect for TEC's de_inferno MVP of 2004, Gouki.

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TAU VS NoA

The grudge match of the earlier rounds, TAU and NoA, came to a surprising close. There was no overtime like the SUpper CPL, because it wasn't even close. A 16-3 defeat against TAU may have cleared all doubts of calling it an Upset over the Summer, but most might argue that the dispute between bzrk's computer dropped during the 4th round was handled incorrectly. Personally, I think it should have been started from the 4th round with cash acceptable for both teams, and both had guns, but, I don't know dick about Counter-Strike. It was started as pistol for only 11 rounds in the half, as opposed to 15. NoA took the match as just desserts for something they had been sore over for roughly six months. The NoA camp was excited and vocal during the match, Element even took the time in the middle of a round to show Method how to correctly flash up right mid. NoA had their share of mistakes in the rounds, including a blatant TK on Shaguar's part, headshotting element as they entered the bombsite. When Element demanded an explanation, Shaguar replied with "shut it, fatty."

TAU's side, on the other end of the room, looked as if they were about to start punching babies. But, would you be happy in their shoes? The loser's bracket isn't the eliminated's bracket (where they compete in a sword fight in the bathroom), so a rematch isn't completely OUT of the question, its just unlikely. Good luck to all of the teams dropping and progressing, I hope you can all give me this much content in the rounds to come.

weenus, outtie like your belly button.