100 Thieves find 2-0 win over Immortals to kick off their Masters run

In the final opening match of Stage 1 Masters, 100 Thieves took down Immortals. The progression was obvious for the First Strike champions. They’ll face Sentinels in the upper bracket second round on Sunday, while Immortals are set to face Luminosity Gaming in the lower bracket tomorrow.

Ascent, the pick of 100 Thieves, was first up, and we saw usual compositions for both sides besides Rhett "Kehmicals" Lynch running Raze instead of Jett. The first few rounds were tight, with Kehmicals grabbing himself a ridiculous amount of Paint Shell kills, but 100 Thieves still won four straight in part thanks to some clutches keeping them ahead. Immortals took a few rounds back, but 100 Thieves showed just how much they’d improved, pulling out new strategies and big Sage lineups from Nicholas "nitr0" Cannella to routinely force Immortals back. Again, Immortals took a few rounds at the end of the half, but it still ended 8-4.

Immortals gained some ground on their own attacking half, however. Over the course of many hectic rounds, their composition showed its strength on the attack, with Andrew "ShoT UP" Orlowski’s Reyna pushing fearlessly through smokes and up the map. One particularly crazy round would result in two locked-down players staring each other in the face:

Immortals would continue to play the half well, even recovering from big early losses, and sending things to overtime. Things were as always tense, and for the first time all day, we went to multiple rounds. Eventually, though, 100 Thieves stepped ahead, and nitr0 clutched it out to win map 1 15-13.

Map 2 began well in favour of Immortals. ShoT UP, on Breach for the map, was crucial in unlocking sites for the team, and pulled up with frags to boot. Immortals also put all their focus to the middle of the map, to great success. Midway through, though, 100 Thieves would begin to pull things back.