Leviatán Leviatán Latin America South Rank #1 tex Ian Botsch kiNgg Francisco Aravena Mazino Roberto Rivas aspas Erick Santos C0M Corbin Lee took home a reverse sweep victory over Cloud9 Cloud9 North America Rank #9 Xeppaa Erick Bach runi Dylan Cade moose Kaleb Jayne vanity Anthony Malaspina OXY Francis Hoang in the lower final of the VCT Americas Last Chance Qualifier, setting up an all-LATAM grand final matchup with KRÜ Esports KRÜ Esports Latin America South Rank #3 keznit Angelo Mori Klaus Nicolas Ferrari Shyy Fabian Usnayo Melser Marco Eliot Machuca Amaro heat Olavo Marcelo . The loss for Cloud9 ends their season disappointingly after finishing second in the Americas regular season.

“There's no words to say how it feels,” said Tacolilla in a post-match interview. “We were so close to losing everything from the year. We knew we had to win, and this was the time to do it.”

It was a full team effort from Leviatán to come from behind for the win. Each player had at least 77 kills across the five maps, and each player went positive in their first duels. Leviatán had a differential of +21 when it came to first bloods in the series.

nzr went 84-63 in the series while playing 4 different agents. (Photo by Tina Jo/Riot Games) Cloud9 beat Leviatán twice during the Americas league, once during Week 7 and once in the lower bracket of Americas playoffs.

The first map, Lotus, was played in both of the previous matchups, Leviatán won the map in the previous matchup after losing the first time to Cloud9. Cloud9 had won Lotus six straight times before losing their last two, including one against Leviatán.

C9 jumped out to an early lead 4-0 on attack, and after Leviatán found their first round, Cloud9 invested four ultimates in a massive round to shatter Leviatán's economy. After that round catapulted C9 to a 7-1 lead, a thrifty win for Leviatán in round nine enabled the LATAM squad to salvage the half at 8-4. Cloud9 looked unbothered on attack, closing out Lotus at a 13-7 scoreline. Leviatán had 13 first bloods on the map, but allowed 10 plants on their defense side.

Heading to Pearl, Cloud9 had banned the map in the previous two matchups between the squads, but were 8-2 on it coming in on the season and went 1-1 in the LCQ. Leviatán were an undefeated 8-0 on Pearl on the season, but had not played it yet in the LCQ.

The first half on Pearl was filled with a barrage of clutches from both teams. Cloud9 fought back after losing the pistol and bonus round to a stalemate at 6-6. C9 then took their own pistol and bonus round victories to propel them to a 10-6 lead, before closing the map out at 13-9.

Cloud9 converted seven 1vX situations on Pearl alone, including three from jakee . Five of Cloud9's seven defensive round wins were off of retakes. Leviatán had 11 full buy rounds, but converted just three of them into round wins.

Cloud9 were 4-0 on Split for the season coming into the third map of the series, while Leviatán were just 3-2. Cloud9 won the bonus round after winning the pistol to open the map, which was their fourth bonus win to that point in the series. Leviatán bounced back with a few well executed retakes to a 6-6 half yet again.

It appeared that Leviatán would use their double duelist comp to win their first map of the series without issue after winning six of the first seven rounds on attack to jump out to map point at 12-7. Cloud9 did not go down without a fight, winning four straight to bring the map to a final round at 12-11. The comeback was not to be for Cloud9, as nzr clutched up with a 4K to take Split for LEV.

The fourth map of the series brought the teams to Haven, where in their prior matchups Cloud9 beat Leviatán twice by a round count of 26-12. Cloud9's attack side looked like it would be another rout, as the North American squad jumped out to a 8-1 lead even after losing the pistol. Leviatán managed to get a couple of rounds back, but still faced a 9-3 deficit at halftime.

Leviatán came alive after winning the pistol, taking eight straight rounds on attack to take the lead at 11-9. Cloud9 invested four ultimates in round 19, but failed to retake successfully. Leviatán closed out the comeback 13-10, off the back of 32 kills from Shyy .

Bind was to be the fifth and final map of the series. Both teams had played Bind just once in the 2023 season, both in the Americas playoffs. Cloud9 were decimated by Evil Geniuses in 13-2 fashion, whereas Leviatán were handled by FURIA, falling 13-6.

The first half of Bind was a back and forth affair, with Leviatán taking an early 4-1 lead. Cloud9 bounced back to take a 5-4 lead before Leviatán closed the half with three straight rounds, culminating with a Mazino clutch that capped off his 14 kill half on Harbor.

After a pistol win for Leviatán, Cloud9 got a massive flawless round win on the following bonus. A very aggressive attack towards the A site in the ensuing round from Cloud9 resulted in Leviatán's own flawless round win to bring the score to 10-6 for Leviatán.

Cloud9's attack was extremely fast-paced off the back of leaf 's Raze, often bringing rounds down to 3v3's or fewer. Leviatán had the answer to the aggression in the form of Mazino and kiNgg , as the duo went a combined 20-4 on the defensive half to complete the reverse sweep on Bind by a score of 13-7.

“It feels like we were finally able to learn after the loss against KRU,” nzr said in a post-match interview. “We pushed forward and showed what we were capable of doing after losing the first two maps.”

Leviatán will face off against KRÜ in the grand final tomorrow for the chance to qualify for Champions 2023.