HEROIC won Stake Ranked Episode 3 in Barcelona, beating K27 3-0 in the grand final to close out an unbeaten run at the $100,000 event. HLTV reports the title capped a debut showing for a roster that changed two players and a coach over the offseason.
The team added Ludvig "Brollan" Brolin and Antonio "MartinezSa" Martinez in place of Yasin "xfl0ud" Koç and Simon "yxngstxr" Boije. The Norwegian organisation also appointed a new head coach, promoting former academy coach Joonas "doto" Forss. HLTV rated HEROIC among the offseason’s winners on the strength of those moves, and Barcelona was the first competitive test of them.
It was the roster’s longest-serving member who set the pace rather than either of the new arrivals. Linus "nilo" Bergman led the side statistically, averaging a 1.19 rating as HEROIC went undefeated through the eight-team double-elimination bracket. In-game leader Christoffer "Chr1zN" Storgaard put the run down to fit rather than firepower.
This is a more fitted team, so to speak. The roles fit, and that is going to do a lot. Everyone has been putting in an enormous amount of work with the short time we’ve had.
K27 pushed the final closer than the scoreline
K27 reached the final the hard way. The young Russian side began the closing day by getting past Ninjas in Pyjamas in a three-map series, their fourth consecutive elimination match after the Ninjas sent them to the lower bracket earlier in the week. It was only their second international LAN, and they played it without Timur "clax" Sabirov, fielding Aleksandr "shalfey" Marenov as a stand-in.
The 3-0 result understates how close the grand final was. K27 came back from 10-2 down on Mirage and nearly forced overtime, then led 11-7 on Dust2 before letting the map, and a chance to extend the series to a fourth, slip away.
The win moved HEROIC up ten places in the global VRS to 27th, a timely result with a closed qualifier for StarSeries Fall and BLAST Bounty matches immediately ahead of them.
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