In a battle between two teams looking to make their first international event, BBL Esports BBL Esports Europe Rank #1 Crewen Ali Eren Sargin Lar0k Yusuf Kaan Kanber Loita Utku Kart Rosé Eren Erzan lovers rock Umut Pekdoğan and Gentle Mates Gentle Mates Europe Rank #7 starxo Patryk Kopczynski bipo Taranvir Singh marteen Martin Pátek GLYPH Conner Garcia Minny Patrik Hušek battled through five maps in VCT EMEA Kickoff's Upper Final, with the Turkish side finishing on top, 3-2.

One of the biggest storylines in the series was the play of marteen , whose 106 kills shattered the EMEA Bo5 kills record. In the end, though, his efforts were not enough. In the end, a more well-rounded performance from BBL, led by 98 from rookie Duelist sensation lovers rock , made the difference.

In the best-of-five series, BBL banned Bind, and Gentle Mates banned Breeze. The series was played out on Haven, Abyss, Pearl, Split, and Corrode. Gentle Mates won Haven 13-11, BBL won Abyss 15-13, BBL won Pearl 16-14, M8 won Split 13-4, and BBL won Corrode 13-6.

In one of the stories of the offseason, the BBL squad worked its way up from the Premier level, winning EMEA Ascension last year under the BBL PCIFIC BBL PCIFIC Inactive banner before joining BBL ahead of the season. In just a few months, the squad will go from a Challengers squad to EMEA's top seed at Masters Santiago.

Throughout the course of the series, both teams played with similar comps. On BBL's pick of Haven, the difference was one agent, as both teams went for a Neon-Yoru double-Duelist pairing with Sova and Cypher. The only difference was Gentle Mates opting for Astra instead of Omen, which is to be expected as they continue to be one of the best Astra-using teams in the region.

Play on the map was streaky to start. BBL claimed the first of two pistol rounds with a 4-0 run to start the map, which was responded to with six straight rounds from Gentle Mates. Despite dropping both pistol rounds, the Mates managed to not just make things close, but did just enough. A run of three straight rounds helped them close out the map, 13-11. marteen picked up a game-high 23 kills on the map, heating up early on.

The series then shifted to M8's pick of Abyss, a map that has been a sore spot in BBL's map pool this year. Entering the game, BBL had the worst retake rate on the map in the entire region, and that was put to the test early as it chose to start on attack.

Again, marteen could do little to no wrong. He continued his sharp streak of shooting from Haven, using the Outlaw to perfection to will M8 into a fast start. Snowballing against Light Armor and Regen Shields, he started the map on a 17/4 run as part of an early 7-2 lead. That run was highlighted by BBL struggling to stage together retakes, often tasked with numerical disadvantages and key pieces of retake utility out of the equation.

BBL changed its defensive approach to play with less aggression, using the clock against M8 in a more disciplined defensive approach to close out the half with three straight round wins to end the half down 7-5.

M8 looked to close out the map by taking its second pistol on it and following it up with the bonus, but soon after, it struggled against the BBL attack. Stretching their opponents thin and forcing them to play retake, BBL won six straight rounds to seize a lead out of seemingly nowhere, and despite giving up map point, forced overtime shortly after.

After exchanging a set of attack rounds, BBL was the first team to find a win on defense, leading to a 15-13 win despite the heroics from marteen, who dropped 39 kills.

Both teams have a claim to be two of the region's strongest teams on Pearl, and early on, BBL asserted itself as the best. A well-coordinated attack helped the Turkish squad get out to a 6-1 lead, but like Abyss, a blowout was not on the cards.

Gentle Mates came alive out of seemingly nowhere, salvaging a 6-6 halftime tie from being five rounds down. The second half promised more of the same, as an M8 pistol round win was hijacked by a successful hero Outlaw buy, keeping thetwo teams tightly knit. BBL seized map point at 12-9, but a second win entered the Gentle Mates sails to force overtime.

Through three sets of overtime, stacked sites were shut down, and momentum switched sides. There was no telling which side of the map was stronger — back-to-back, defense rounds were followed by domination on attack, with BBL ending up on top with a fight that went down to the wire.

Two rounds separated the two teams after three maps, but Split was a change in the status quo. In BBL's first appearance on the map in Kickoff, Gentle Mates thoroughly outclassed their opponents. With Minny finding near-perfect lurk timings on Viper and bipo picking up where marteen left off, Gentle Mates dominated from the beginning. A 6-0 open resulted in a 9-3 halftime advantage, with both of BBL's timeouts burned as it moved onto attack.

Gentle Mates claimed its second pistol of the map to claim a 5-3 advantage in the series, and shut down a force-buy thanks to heroics from starxo , who had back-to-back clutches to open the half. In a series of razor-thin margins, Gentle Mates blew BBL out of the water on Split, winning 13-4 to bring the series to Corrode.

The decider map, Corrode, was set to host both teams' debuts on the map in 2026. Once again, one agent separated the two teams' comps, with M8 opting for Fade and BBL picking Sova.

Gentle Mates claimed its third straight pistol round to extend its lead in that regard to 6-3, but very soon found trouble going up against the attacking BBL. The Operator struggled to find an impact in the hands of marteen and bipo, opening the door for four straight BBL rounds. A timeout from pakko and KUNDIKUNDI in Gentle Mates' coaching booth recalibrated the M8 defense for three straight, then forcing a timeout from BBL's KEY and Viento . While both teams were held to a narrow 7-5 at halftime, BBL had all of the momentum moving over onto defense, out-shooting and playing circles around M8.

BBL won the crucial pistol to start the second half, and Gentle Mates shut down the bonus round in clean fashion, but the chain of events opened the door for lovers rock to buy an Operator. At every turn, Gentle Mates seemed to have no avenue to find another attack round. While M8's experience helped it through the first four maps of the series, fatigue seemed to catch up as Corrode went on.

Led by lovers rock, who went 10/3 on defense alone, BBL clinched the map and the series, never looking uncomfortable in its first appearance on the map.

marteen's 106 kills, 62 of which came in the first two maps, will live in infamy as a strong effort that ended up not being enough, while lovers rock's 98 led the way for BBL. bipo and Minny had 91 and 86 kills in addition to marteen's efforts, while Lar0k had 80 as part of a BBL roster that finished with over 70 kills each.

Up next

While BBL will begin looking into hotel accommodations and sightseeing in Santiago, Gentle Mates' EMEA Kickoff campaign continues. The squad, after losing the first of three best-of-five chances, will have two more opportunities to qualify for Santiago. Immediately, they will meet FNATIC FNATIC Europe Rank #2 crashies Austin Roberts Boaster Jake Howlett kaajak Kajetan Haremski Veqaj Sylvain Pattyn Alfajer Emir Ali Beder in the Middle Final tomorrow.

VCT EMEA Kickoff will continue with the following matches:

• Team Vitality vs. Team Liquid (Lower Round 5)
• Gentle Mates vs. FNATIC (Middle Final)
• M8/FNC vs. VIT/TL (Lower Final)