The Kyiv Animajor Group Stage comes to an end as all of the standings are set. Team Nigma and PSG.LGD are in the winner’s bracket, and Team Spirit fought through a tiebreaker to secure the final playoff spot in the Kyiv Animajor.
PSG.LGD and Team Nigma take top spots at Kyiv Animajor Group Stage
At the top of the standings are PSG.LGD and Team Nigma. Both teams had different paths to get to the top of the standings.
PSG.LGD have been dominant since the beginning of the Group Stage. They come in as the second seed of the Chinese Dota Pro Circuit (DPC) and continue to show China’s superiority among international competition. PSG.LGD are the only team with no losses in the entirety of the Group Stage.
On the other hand, Team Nigma have had to fight through constant obstacles to secure their spot in the playoffs. Starting out in the Wild Card Stage, they had to play through a close tiebreaker against Invictus Gaming to even make it into the Group Stage. Team Nigma took their momentum from the Wild Card Stage to solidify their play further into the event. Throughout the Group Stages, Team Nigma only lost one series against a strong TNC Predator team and were one win away from PSG.LGD in the standings. While Team Nigma have made it into the playoffs, they will still need to get a top two placing in order to receive a direct invite to The International.
Updated Cheat Sheet.
Will likely be hosed on Day 1 of the Playoffs. Many teams *can* qualify with what they have or a few more points – but also would leave themselves open to being left out in the dark by some wild AniMajor story.
With so much to play for it's gonna be wild. pic.twitter.com/C7NppmyUOl
— Ben Steenhuisen (@Noxville) June 7, 2021
Team Spirit take the tiebreaker
The last match of the day was a tiebreaker between two teams who struggled throughout the Group Stages: Team Liquid and Team Spirit. Both the European and CIS representatives had to fight it out for the final playoff spot.
🐉🐉🐉#SpiritDota #Dota2 #WePlayAniMajor pic.twitter.com/0R8I9zIUdR
— Team Spirit (@Team__Spirit) June 7, 2021
Team Liquid needed a win against Evil Geniuses to confirm their spot in the Kyiv Animajor playoffs. However, They were only able to tie Evil Geniuses, leading to a tiebreaker situation with Team Spirit. Despite Team Liquid’s decent gold lead, they were unable to close out the game. An unfortunate initiation by Syed “Suma1L” Hassan on Illya and “Yatoro” Mulyarchuk’s Drow on Ranger led to a team fight that shifted the tides in favor of Team Spirit. From that point on, Team Liquid was unable to regain the momentum they had before. Now, the European DPC’s second seed must fight through the regional qualifier in order to get an invitation to The International.
