Quintic vs. vVv

Quintic versus vVv Gaming is the first North American match that we have tonight. It will be a best of one series in the CEVO league. While many people are skeptical of best of one’s and especially no-name or lesser-known teams such as these two, I have to admit that North American games are my specialty. Looking at previous matchups, statistics, rosters, and also ESEA rankings, it’s easy to see that on paper vVv Gaming is the better team.

If anyone remembers the team Mostly Harmless from before in last season’s ESEA matches, this is the same exact team with a few new additions. Currently this team is ranked 14th in the North American Premier division on ESEA, with a record of 2-7. Arguably this season’s Premier division is harder than last seasons, but still they’re below some lesser-known premier team names that you might not recognize from last season. The most recent game that they’ve had that was official, was versus Method, on September 26 of last month. This game was also a best of one series on the map mirage, with a final score of 16-10, (5 terrorist rounds, 5 CT rounds). This isn’t too bad of a result for a team of vVv’s caliber, but also must be noted that Method is one of the lower ranked teams in the upper echelons of the tier one North American teams. Additionally they were playing with a stand in player from their roster, with jvw out, and ak-NY playing instead. Looking at the match history on ESEA, we can see that they’ve lost 4 out of the 10 scrims that they’ve played, albeit the teams that they’ve lost to (Casaless, WinOutNET) are of higher caliber than them themselves.

Moving on to Quintic. The lineup of this team is a bit more unknown than that of vVv. The only player that I recognize, is Polen, who many of you may know from playing with shroud on his stream. He’s a decent player, but I haven’t seen him play in a competitive scene in a while, with the only one time being when he stood in for team that I don’t remember. Looking at their scrim history, there haven’t been any official matches outside of ESEA to my knowledge since July 30, around four months ago. When we do look at ESEA, we can see that there in the Main division, which happens to be one tier down from premier, the league that vVv is in. Additionally they are ranked 33rd in their division. Their current league record shows that they have lost 3 out of the past 9 matches, losing to teams mostly at a higher rank in their own division than they are. Some of these games have been close however, but they still are losses.

Bringing this to conclusion, these are two lower tier North American teams, with not too much information regarding them. vVv may have slightly more history and background behind them, but they’re also playing with the new roster that hasn’t had too many games. Quintic on the other hand, has been featured on lounge a few times before, but if you look at the number of people who bet on their games, it’s much lower than any other North American game just due to the fact that there is not very much information behind them. Because of these reasons, and because of the relatively unknown nature of both of these teams, my best recommendation for a bet would be to skip. Sure, vVv is the better team on paper, but again it’s a best of one game, against an unknown opponent. If you really have the bug in have to bet, I don’t think it would be unfair to place a bet on vVv, but upsets do happen in best of one series.

TL:DR: There is way too little information to make an educated guess on who’s going to win this best of one. Although if you must bet, a wager on vVv would make the most sense to me.
MY BET: SKIP
MY ODDS: 30 – 70 in favor of vVv

Team Liquid vs. Luminosity Gaming

The second match tonight will be between Team Liquid and Luminosity Gaming. These teams are in the top tier of North American Counter Strike, and have put up international results as well as domestic. By looking at past matchups, individual players, scrimmages, and official league games, we can try to see who has the greatest chance of winning this best of two.

We’ll start off by looking at Team Liquid, the North American team. This lineup has been getting stronger and stronger with the addition of Hiko, who can play a very competent lurk role. Having lots of talent in the two younger players Nitro, and Elige, a good solid player in Fugly, and the Counter Strike: Source legend adreN as AWPer and IGL, Liquid are indeed a very strong team. Looking at their past results overseas and domestically, we can see that they have been doing…decent! They were able to beat Fnatic on their home map, cobblestone, but ultimately fell in a 2-1 fashion to the Swedish team. Against VP, they took the Polish to a full 30 rounds on overpass, with the score ending being 16 – 14 in favor of VP, but also losing 16 – 9 on mirage, which is arguably one of VP’s best maps. They’re able to beat the Australians Team Renegade quite handily with end maps scores of 16 – 7 on cache, and 16 – 4 on cobblestone. Now, looking domestically, they’ve also been doing alright in the states. With wins over lesser opponents such as Team Coast, FolloweSports.com, Method, and Denial, their records since they come back from PGL, has been quite good with only one loss against Denial, tying a best of two series 1-1. If we look at their ESEA league matches and scrimmages, they currently only have one loss in their record of 5 matches, with the team beating them being Conquest 16 – 6 on Train. There currently aren’t any ESEA scrimmages available for observation.

Next we have the Brazilian team that is playing in the United States, Team Luminosity. Under the direction of primary AWPer and IGL FALLEN, this team has done equally as well internationally less recently back in August, almost upsetting Fnatic on mirage, with an end score of 16 – 14 in Fnatic favor. More recently they’ve been doing fairly well in the North American scene, having a few close games but also some that have been very one-sided. Beating the same teams as Team Liquid has, (Team Coast, FolloweSports.com, Method, and Denial) they’ve also had a few more matches against teams such as: Winterfox, Conquest, and complexity. Looking at the lineup of this team, we have amazing riflers fer and coldzera, FALLEN, as mentioned before, consistent player steel, and finally the more support type player, boltz. This lineup has mostly stayed the same as has Liquids, over the majority of the team’s existence. The only change made in this lineup, was the cutting of zqk, and the addition of cold. However that was many months ago and the team has come together quite nicely since that change. Looking at their ESEA league matches, they currently have a record of 2 – 2, with the two losses being against Team complexity and C9, arguably two of the best teams in North America. Looking at their scrimmages, they have won all but one of their scrimmages against mostly unknown teams, with the exception of GamesAcademy, and have a strange 16 – 14 loss against an unranked team named “Born Again Hard.” This looks like it was composed as a PUG type team made up of many individual professional players from varying tier 1 North American teams, and shouldn’t make any difference in their overall consistency of play.

Pulling this all together, these teams are very equally matched more or less, with a slight edge being to Team Liquid, mostly due to their international performance. Both Liquid and Luminosity however, as we can see in their scrimmage history, have the possibility of losing to lower tier teams. While currently on lounge, the odds are favored much in the way of Liquid, I would say that this provides an excellent opportunity for a bet on Luminosity. Because these teams are more or less very close, there is also a good chance because it is a best of two, that this game will end up tied, at 1-1. Once again however the odds for Liquid are too high, and is impossible to resist the decent odds of betting on Luminosity.

TL:DR: both of these two teams are top-tier North American teams who have done well both domestically and internationally. Because of this, the odds should not be as favored as they are in the way of Liquid. However because it is a best of two, there is a very high chance of the game tying 1-1, in which case all skins will be returned.

LOUNGE ODDS: 69 – 31 IN FAVOR OF LIQUID

MY ODDS: 60- 40/ 55-45 IN FAVOR OF LIQUID

MY BET: Medium on Luminosity BECAUSE of these skewed odds.