Natus Vincere qualified for the IEM Beijing quarter-finals by beating Falcons 2-1 in their group's final lower-bracket decider, eliminating Falcons from the event, HLTV reported. The series was a rematch of the teams' meeting on day one, which NAVI won 2-0.
Both teams reached the decider through 2-0 lower-bracket semi-final wins. Falcons beat HEROIC 13-8 on Ancient and 13-6 on Dust2, with Maksim "kyousuke" Lukin rated 1.90. NAVI beat B8 13-8 on Ancient, then built a 12-7 lead on Dust2 before B8 pushed the map to the final round of regulation, which NAVI took to close it 13-11.
Falcons won the opening map, Ancient, where kyousuke's 130 ADR first half kept them from another 2-0 defeat. HLTV noted that NAVI lost Ancient even though both Ihor "w0nderful" Zhdanov and Valeriy "b1t" Vakhovskiy finished it above a 1.75 rating, only the second time that has happened at MVP events; the first was also NAVI, against HEROIC in 2024. According to HLTV Brain, teams won 99.93 percent of map appearances in which two teammates each reached that mark, 6,957 of 6,962.
NAVI then took Inferno, where w0nderful went 25-4, and opened the decider on Mirage with a 12-0 T side. During that run Falcons lost a 5v3 and a 5v2, and kyousuke was knifed by Drin "makazze" Shaqiri. w0nderful ended the series with a 1.58 rating and b1t with 1.78, while Finn "karrigan" Andersen finished on 0.64. "We gained so much speed as a team, we were in flow state, everything worked for us," b1t said after the match.
HLTV said it was Falcons' first group-stage exit at a LAN event this season, with the team already out of the top five of the world ranking and the reigning Major champions after their Cologne win. Nikola "NiKo" Kovač told HLTV's Janko "YNk" Paunović that NAVI had been much better on Mirage and Inferno and that Falcons were punished for everything they tried.
We knew before this event that we were not a title contender team. We wanted to show improvement but we failed to do so. It's a rough season for us.
