ROAD TO SIX MAJOR JÖNKÖPING: NA TEAMS

Stats, predictions, and more… We take a deeper look at the NA teams qualified for Six Major Jönköping.

(Credit: Ubisoft)

This year has already been the best year for NA since 2017 (when LATAM and APAC entered the international tournaments.) With 2 international titles, TSM (Six Invitational) and DarkZero (Six Major Charlotte). From 2017 to 2021, NA has 2 titles and 6 runner-ups!

But the region is the biggest winner of the Six Invitational. 3 Titles against 2 for EU and 1 for LATAM. Still behind in the Six Major titles, 1 Title (NA) against 3 (EU) and 2 (LATAM). TSM, Soniqs, Spacestation, and Mirage have themselves a mission to seek that technical tie of Six Major titles with LATAM.

TSM

(Credit: @TSM)

No other team in the world has experienced such a roller coaster ride as TSM. Six Invitational champions, and soon after that 9th in NAL Stage 1 and 8th in Stage 2, stopping at the Gamers8 group stage (the group with BDS, Falcons, and MiBR), but managed to return after good changes in the line-up.

In this stage, the team had 7 wins and 2 losses. Their games had many kills in each round; an average of 7.19 kills (2nd among the teams qualified to Jönköping in Stage 3). With around 1 Clutches per Map, (5th) and 19% of the attacks had plants for them (4th).

Group:

• Team Liquid – LATAM 2nd
• Sandbox – APAC 3rd
• Heroic – EU 4th

Speed Rounds: Slow – 60% of actions for late rounds

OPK: Good – 61% Wins

KPR: Good – 3.87

DPR: Okay – 3.32

Player to Watch: Jason “Beaulo” Doty

KPR: 0.88 | KD: 1.35 | OPK: 15-8 (+7)

Plant per Atk: 4% | Clutch per Map: 0.33 | SRV: 35%

Prediction: In the fight for First place

Soniqs

(Credit: @Soniqs)

Another great roller coaster of emotions during the year. The team had a good Six Invitational, finishing in 5th – 6th, but soon after, they had a stage 1 of the NAL well below. For the second season, the team had a significant performance improvement, securing second place and a spot in the Six Major Berlin, but not all the news was good, as team captain Seth “supr” Hoffman announced that he would be leaving the team after Major Berlin. The team ended the competition still in the group stage and also lost player Alexander “Yeti” Lawson to a direct rival, Spacestation. To replace the two losses, Emilio “Geometrics” Leynez and Shaun “Gunnar” Pottorff join the team, and the improvement was clear, and they arrive well for the Six Major Jönköping.

In this stage, the team had 6 wins and 3 losses. Their games had a few kills in each round; an average of 6.89 kills (16th among the teams qualified for Jönköping in Stage 3). With around 0.22 Clutches per Map, (16th) and 4% of the attacks had plants for them (16th).

Group:

• Cyclops – APAC 1st
• MNM – EU 3rd
• BD – LATAM 4th

Speed Rounds: Fast – 13% of actions for late rounds

OPK: Okay – 55% Wins

KPR: Okay – 3.72

DPR: Good – 3.17

Player to Watch: Pablo “Gryxr” Rebeil

KPR: 1.49 | KD: 0.83 | OPK: 7-3 (+4)

Plant per Atk: 2% | Clutch per Map: 0.11 | SRV: 44%

Prediction: Top 4

Spacestation

Credit: @Spacestation

This year was too hard for Spacestation, in the Six Invitational stayed in 9th – 12th, for Stage 1 of NAL almost qualified to Six Major Charlotte, 5th, but Stage 2 was more difficult, with a performance far below expectations for the lineup, and with that Alexander “Skys” Magor announced his departure of Siege, SSG trialed replacement Lorenzo “Dexter” Albeira for Gamers8, but his performance didn’t please the team, which ended up with them instead looking to hire Yeti from Soniqs. For stage 3 they saw a good improvement and qualification for their first Six Major of the year.

In this stage, the team had 6 wins and 3 losses. Their games had a fair amount of kills in each round; an average of 7.08 kills (7th among the teams qualified for Jönköping in Stage 3). With around 0.78 Clutches per Map, (9th) and 16% of the attacks had plants for them (7th).

Group:

• W7M – LATAM 1st
• BDS – EU 2nd
• FURY – APAC 4th

Speed Rounds: Medium – 47% of actions for late rounds

OPK: Okay – 55% Wins

KPR: Okay – 3.74

DPR: Okay – 3.34

Player to Watch: Alexander “Yeti” Lawson

KPR: 0.95 | KD: 1.4 | OPK: 18-5 (+13)

Plant per Atk: 2% | Clutch per Map: 0.11 | SRV: 32%

Prediction: In the fight for the Top 8

Mirage

Credit:@ericananmalay

The biggest surprise of this major is that the team comes to dispute its first international tournament. The team started to play in the North American League in 2021, played 6 stages of the championship, in their first stage they came to be 3rd in the competition, but in that stage, they wouldn’t secure a spot for the Six Major, and after that, the performance was well below, with a 7th (Stage 2 – 2021), 6th (Stage 3 – 2021), 10th (Stage 1 – 2022) and 10th (Stage 2 – 2022) place. The team for this stage decided to hire two outstanding NACL players, Lorenzo “Dexter” Albeira (who auditioned at Spacestation) and Jesse “Mohesse” Sheffield, and got the spot in the last round, playing against Astralis, winner of the last two stages of the NAL.

In this stage, the team had 4 wins and 5 losses. Their games had a fair amount of kills in each round; an average of 7.05 kills (9th among the teams qualified to Jönköping in Stage 3). With around 1.33 Clutches per Map, (1st) and 23% of the attacks had plants for them (1st).

Group:

• Wolves – EU 1st
• Dire Wolves – APAC 2nd
• Faze Clan – LATAM 3rd

Speed Rounds: Slow – 78% of actions for late rounds

OPK: Okay – 45% Wins

KPR: Poor – 3.51

DPR: Poor – 3.54

Player to Watch: Robert “Melted” Kormylo

KPR: 0.78 | KD: 1.14 | OPK: 11-8 (+3)

Plant per Atk: 6% | Clutch per Map: 0.44 | SRV: 31%

Prediction: In the fight for the Top 8

NA’s best odds are with TSM and Soniqs, Spacestation has a great team but the draw put them in a very difficult group with two title contenders (W7M and BDS), and Mirage for the one presented in NAL, doesn’t show a such a solid work to seek the title, in addition to being a group with two potential underdogs in the competition (Dire Wolves and Wolves). Real chances of the third North American title of the year.

Correction issued November 15: An error was corrected in the above paragraph where the statistic breakdown under Player to Watch was published with the incorrect player’s name. The correct player and stat combination now appears.