Today's China Stage 2 playoffs opened with upper-bracket showdowns between JD Gaming JD Gaming China Rank #8 jkuro Yong Haochong (杨浩聪) zhe Niu Zhe (牛哲) Yuicaw Huang Yung-chieh (黃湧傑) crownfisher Li Ao (李翱) BerLIN Zhang Bolin (張柏霖) and TYLOO TYLOO China Rank #6 splash Moses Christophe Jonathan Scales Zhang Zhen (张震) Erv Shen Zhiwei slowly Kelun Sun (孙科伦) SiuFatBB Pong Gaa Hei (庞加曦) xihe Peng Wenbo (彭文博) and Xi Lai Gaming Xi Lai Gaming China Rank #1 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) and Bilibili Gaming Bilibili Gaming China Rank #3 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) . JD Gaming and Bilibili Gaming claimed victory, setting up an upper final clash where the winner earns a place in the grand final.

JD Gaming squeaks by TYLOO in a close 2-1 series

With both teams coming from quick 2-0 batterings of their opponents, JD Gaming and TYLOO squared off. TYLOO held the upper hand, winning three of the last four encounters with JDG.

The match started off on TYLOO's pick of Breeze. The compositional changes immediately came to the forefront, with TYLOO opting for a Harbor as opposed to its previous Astra pick.

Despite it being TYLOO's map pick, JDG looked at home. After winning a flawless pistol round, JDG continued that dominance owning both A and B sites on its attack to start on a 7-0 scoreline before TYLOO could win its first two rounds.

JDG answered back, with the half ending 10-2. The second half started the same way. A BerLIN Sheriff 3k while taking B-Main space, combined with a failed 1v2 from Scales on B site, solidified JDG's pistol victory.

TYLOO found an answer with an A site hit, extending its survival by one more round at 12-3. A slowly 3k and another A site execute looked to ignite a comeback with the scoreline at 12-4. TYLOO's attack stifled JDG's defense throughout the second half, but JDG closed the door on the comeback, taking Breeze 13-7.

JDG's resident Duelist player zhe stood out, finishing Breeze with a 25/11/4 KDA along with an astonishing 337 ACS.

Summit was the next map. Both teams looked comfortable on each other's map picks as TYLOO started off to a blazing 7-1 start on its attack side after winning its first pistol round of the series. A jkuro Operator B site hold weathered the storm, ending the half 8-4 in favor of TYLOO.

A nearly flawless TYLOO pistol round and bonus round extended the lead to 10-4. As on Breeze, the losing team started to come back on the tail end of the map. JDG stormed through TYLOO's defense, winning six out of the last seven rounds. However, JDG's slight comeback fell short as TYLOO closed out Summit 13-10.

Erv 's hot start on attack helped the Controller player finish Summit with a 21/13/6 KDA and server-high 252 ACS.

Last but not least, Ascent. JDG exploited a gap in TYLOO's setup, opting for a single-Duelist composition centered around Yoru and looked to anchor both sites on defense with a double-Sentinel Deadlock and Cypher duo.

JDG won the pistol and bonus round, but the double-Sentinel composition proved difficult on attack as TYLOO won six of the next seven rounds, finishing the half 7-5. JDG's gamble eventually paid off. Once the side swap happened, TYLOO won the pistol round, but couldn't crack the site anchors. JDG stole the second round with a thrifty and never looked back, finishing Ascent 13-9 and knocking TYLOO to the lower bracket.

zhe didn't just steal the show on map one, he did it across the entire series, finishing with a 53/40/7 KDA and solid 10-7 in first kills. JDG now advances to face the winner of the day's second series, Xi Lai Gaming and Bilibili.

TYLOO heads down to the lower bracket, with a match against All Gamers All Gamers China Rank #5 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) tomorrow.

Bilibili Gaming gets past Xi Lai Gaming

Both Bilibili and Xi Lai came off 2-1 victories in the quarterfinals, looking to carry their winning ways into this series. The series went the distance, but Bilibili dominated on Haven, solidifying its spot against JDG in the upper final and moving one step closer to a Champions berth.

The series started off on Xi Lai's pick of Lotus. Xi Lai, famously known for its triple-Sentinel Lotus composition, has stepped away from the shenanigans this stage and settled for a Neon and Waylay double-Duelist line up, making this its eighth compositional change in the last month on Lotus.

XLG flew to a quick 2-0 start after winning the pistol. BLG quickly responded by winning XLG's eco, but once the full-buy round came around, XLG asserted its dominance leading to a 3-1 start. BLG's double-Duelist Raze and Waylay composition dove into C site too many times to count, leading to a 7-5 lead at halftime. The second half played out nearly as tight. XLG looked to close out the map winning the pistol round and eventual thrifty on round 15.

BLG responded with four straight rounds of their own. XLG tried to complete the comeback, but BLG won the last two rounds, one of them with three players carrying Sheriffs, winning 13-11. XLG's Lysoar stole the show with a strong 28/18/9 KDA despite losing the map.

XLG opened play looking to claim victory on BLG's map pick of Split. BLG won the pistol and subsequent second round. XLG responded by winning BLG's eco round, but lost the full gun round. Once XLG found their rhythm, the team proved impossible to stop. Double-Duelist dives by Rarga and NoMan led XLG to a 7-5 half. The second half followed the same script. BLG won the pistol and bonus, but BLG could muster nothing else. XLG closed out BLG's map pick by winning 13-8. XLG's duo led the way with NoMan topping the scoreboard with a 23/11/0 KDA. Rarga followed closely behind at 18/14/4.

The series ended on Haven. A dominant showing by Bilibili headlined the map. Five straight rounds to start the map off on defense left XLG reeling. XLG began a comeback, but BLG quickly put XLG's flame out, dominating the half 10-2.

In the second half, whzy 's Chamber proved too challenging, with BLG closing out the map 13-5. whzy topped the server with a tremendous performance on Chamber finishing 26/8/2 on an 89% KAST. Across the three maps, whzy and Knight combined for 112 kills, leading BLG to victory and a chance at clinching the grand final spot with an upper final clash against JDG.

XLG will meet Nova Esports Nova Esports China Rank #2 qiutiaN Bijan Moeinzadeh (慕英毕强) cb Wang Qingchuan (王庆川) Ezeir Zhao Zejun (赵泽骏) GuanG Guang Honglin (光洪霖) swagzor Mikhail Vaniushin in a do-or-die match in the lower bracket tomorrow on August 20.