While the first day of the Esports Championship Series group stages was rife with upsets and exciting matches, the second day eschewed the upsets in favor of incredibly close matches filled with intense action. OpTic Gaming and SK Gaming were the two teams left standing once the dust settled on the second day of competition en route to the $250,000 first prize.
Group A: OpTic Gaming takes the tough road
While OpTic did eventually break through to the semifinals, the road there certainly wasn't the easiest. Their day began with a matchup against their North American brethren in Cloud9. The series began with Dust 2, where Cloud9 picked up an easy 16-8 win. Cloud9 looked to continue their dominating ways in Game 2 on Overpass, finishing the first half with a 12-3 lead, but OpTic would wake up and make their presence known. OpTic won all 13 rounds played in the second half, picking up a spectacular 16-12 win to force a decisive Game 3 on Cache. In a repeat of Game 2, OpTic found themselves down big at the half before storming back. While OpTic needed an overtime period this time, NA's resident Cinderella story finally put Cloud9 away to move on to a date with FaZe Clan.
OpTic managed to break out of their pattern of slow starts in the deciding match of Group A. In this series against FaZe, it was OpTic who would consistently start strong with leads in the first half. In Game 1 it was a 10-5 lead that OpTic turned into a 16-10 win. While OpTic began Game 2 with a 12-3 lead, they were unable to hold on against a determined FaZe side. Philip "aizy" Aistrup and Aleksi "allu" Jalli helped FaZe punch through the Green Wall with 12 straight wins between the end of regulation and overtime to take the map 19-15. Whereas many teams would have been mentally broken after such a tough loss, OpTic came back with renewed energy in Game 3 on Cache, essentially waltzing their way to a 16-4 win to take the series.
Group B: SK Gaming prevails in the end
While SK Gaming had to battle through the lower bracket of Group B, they still managed to secure a spot in the semifinals. The road there started with an easy series for SK, as Immortals didn't really put up that much of a fight until the very end. Things started off on Cache where SK took the map by a score of 16-9, with Fernando "fer" Alvarenga coming in clutch with a strong 27/16 KD (kills/deaths) and 111.7 ADR (average damage per round). Game 2 on Train - usually SK's best map by far - was a much closer affair. Things went back and forth for most of the game before SK took control and closed out the 16-14 win. Despite finishing with a negative KD, stand-in Ricardo "fox" Pacheco came up with a few kills in the final few rounds that pushed SK ahead to the Group B decider match.
The last match of the day for SK against Team Dignitas wasn't as easy as their series from earlier in the day. SK got off to a 1-0 lead in the series with a big 16-9 win on Cache, where Marcelo "coldzera" David posted a 27/12 KD and a 107.5 ADR. In stark contrast, the second game on Mirage is one that SK will want to purge from their memory, as they looked flustered all game while Dignitas picked up an easy 16-7 win to force a Game 3. While the match was hotly contested until the very end, SK stabilized late with five straight round wins to secure a 16-10 victory over Dignitas that punched SK's ticket to the semifinals.
With one final day of competition left, only four teams are left to duke it out for the combined $750,000 prize pool. The playoffs will begin with Astralis facing SK at 2:15pm EST, followed by Team EnVyUs and OpTic Gaming. After the incredible action seen throughout Day 2, one thing's for sure: the best is still yet to come.