The second day of the China Stage 2 playoffs saw seeded teams Bilibili Gaming Bilibili Gaming China Rank #5 whzy Wang Haozhe (王昊哲) rushia Wang Xiaojie (王晓杰) nephh Marcus Tan yilai Gu Yiming (顾依铭) Knight Liu Yuxiang (刘宇翔) bud Yang Renyu (杨韧余) FT Yan Shuaibo (闫帅博) and Xi Lai Gaming Xi Lai Gaming China Rank #2 WsLeo Huang Pinwei (黄品维) Sharks Qiu Ge (邱戈) Lysoar Liang Youhao (梁优好) NoMan James Man Rarga Arthur Churyumov happywei Deng Minwei (邓闵维) joining the fray against Trace Esports Trace Esports China Rank #12 LuoK1ng Zhang Zhanpeng (张展鹏) Kai Lu Zhinan (卢智楠) FengF Song Xuefeng (宋学锋) FKEY Ke Chen deLb Delbert Tanoto and All Gamers All Gamers China Rank #8 Shr1mp Yang Yong (杨勇) K1ra Huang Zhihao (黄志豪) Bai Zhang Zeyang (张泽洋) f4ngeer Roman Smirnov iamgrq Gao Ruiqi (高锐琦) respectively. BLG and AG each found 2-1 wins, setting up the next round in the upper bracket and sending their opponents down to the lowers.

Bilibili staves off Trace 2-1 after 16-14 map two brawl

The first match of the day pitted the first seed from Group Omega against a Trace squad that had completed a lower bracket run through play-ins following a 0-5 group stage.

The series kicked off on BLG's map pick of Lotus. Both teams utilized Waylay-Raze compositions, with the only difference between them being rushia 's Cypher versus deLb 's Vyse. Trace held a slight 7-5 advantage at halftime after winning the pistol. They extended that lead with a second pistol, remaining ahead for the rest of the map on their defense to win out 13-8.

Sunset was on a knife's edge. BLG started in control with a stalwart 9-3 defense; whzy was dominating the server on Yoru, ending the half with 19 kills to only seven deaths. On the other side of halftime, Trace began to fight back; a FengF 1v2 closed the gap to 11-8, and three more rounds down 12-9 forced the map to overtime.

FengF clutches the 1v2 in the nick of time.

All six rounds of overtime played out on the B site. Both teams traded their own share of successful postplants and retakes, but BLG finally were able to string two in a row to win the map 16-14. Knight finished at the top of the scoreboard with a 27/19/14 KDA and a 1.41 rating as Omen.

Split was the decider. BLG opted into another Waylay-Yoru composition, while Trace went for a slightly different Waylay-Neon one. Starting on defense, BLG put together strong site holds and floods to shut out Trace, with two out of Trace's four attacking rounds coming from eco wins. Trace won the second pistol round, but that only delayed the inevitable—two rounds off of early picks on A brought BLG to 11-6 as they eventually closed it out 13-9.

BLG advances in the upper bracket and will next face off against XLG for a spot in the upper final. Trace, back to the lower bracket, will play AG for their tournament lives tomorrow, Aug. 16.

Xi Lai takes down All Gamers in 2-1 fashion

XLG versus AG was a rematch of their match in week two of the group stage, which XLG won 2-0; that result ultimately broke the tie between the two 3-2 teams and sent XLG directly to playoffs, while AG had to fight through the play-ins to meet again in the playoffs.

Both teams dominated on their own map picks, starting on AG's pick of Split. In the Jett-Raze-Skye mirror, AG's Duelists ran rampant around the map for a 9-3 attacking half; K1ra had 18 kills in twelve rounds on Raze while f4ngeer racked up 16 on Jett. A clean double pistol win ensured a quick 13-3 victory.

Over on Lotus, both teams again went for similar double-Duelist lineups, with the only difference being Rarga on Waylay versus K1ra on Raze. XLG mounted an unbreakable 10-2 defense, finding consistent success with aggressive A Rubble pushes and fast floods. AG scrounged a few more rounds, but the deficit was too large to overcome as XLG took a 13-5 win. Rarga ended the map with 17 kills and 180 ADR.

The final map was Sunset. AG got off to a 6-0 start off the back of their newest addition Bai locking down B as Cypher, but a 3v5 postplant on the A site and a 1v3 from happywei at the end of the half turned the score into a more salvageable 8-4 at the half.

happywei pulls off the 1v3 postplant.

In the end, XLG's defense proved even more difficult to break. XLG converted a pistol and a bonus of their own, pushing deep into Mid to draw the score at 8-8. From there, despite investing two timeouts, AG could find no answers to XLG's overwhelming retakes as the score climbed to 12-8 and then 13-10.

The China Stage 2 playoffs continue tomorrow with the following matchups: