G2 Esports G2 Esports North America Rank #1 jawgemo Alexander Mor trent Trent Cairns valyn Jacob Batio JonahP Jonah Pulice leaf Nathan Orf have eliminated Gen.G Gen.G Korea Rank #1 Foxy9 Jung Jae-sung (정재성) Ash Ha Hyun-cheol (하현철) t3xture Kim Na-ra (김나라) Munchkin Byeon Sang-beom (변상범) Suggest Seo Jae-young (서재영) Karon Kim Won-tae (김원태) from Masters Toronto with a 2-1 victory in the second round of the lower bracket. They will play the winner of the ongoing FNATIC FNATIC Europe Rank #1 crashies Austin Roberts Boaster Jake Howlett kaajak Kajetan Haremski Chronicle Timofey Khromov Alfajer Emir Ali Beder vs. Sentinels Sentinels North America Rank #4 N4RRATE Marshall Massey bang Sean Bezerra Zellsis Jordan Montemurro zekken Zachary Patrone johnqt Mohamed Amine Ouarid clash in the lower bracket semifinal.

The first map of the match felt like a warmup for Haven and Icebox, the two that followed. G2 hurriedly got to a 10-2 lead on their Lotus pick and, while they gave up a few more rounds, ultimately won the map 13-7.

The next two maps came down to the wire, as both were only decided on the final round of regulation. Gen.G's t3xture got his elbows out on Haven and facilitated his team's 13-11 win, but couldn't repeat that performance on Icebox.

Even though Gen.G looked to be cruising to a dominating win on Icebox, G2 remained latched onto the game. Down 11-4, a strong B take unlocked the match and paved the way for a miracle comeback in which they eventually came out on top 13-11.

Ice. Cold.

And yet, that win once seemed so distant.

Prior to that B take, G2's only big moment came in the waning rounds of Haven. Finding himself in a 1v1 with the Spike planted, leaf toyed with t3xture for almost 30 seconds as the timer ran down. G2's star moved around the site, baiting t3xture, and creating enough time for his team to secure the 11th point.

t3xture did take down leaf in that round, going on to drop 22 players throughout Haven. It was the second-highest kill count of the match, bested only by leaf in map three.

That was the final round G2 would get on Haven, despite leaf's heroics. It signalled he was finally finding his footing after a relatively quiet first map, and was about to get fired up on Icebox.

But it took G2 a long time to show up. On round 16, they took a timeout. Their initial decision to hit A was quickly choked out, prompting the team to force a B hit. They lost an early duel, but a Sage Resurrection coupled with a flank from leaf created enough chaos for the Americans to find their fifth point.

That was the first of nine straight that G2 would go on to dominate, closing out the map with a monumental comeback to find the 13-11 match-winning victory.

leaf maintained his performance coming into Icebox, picking up Killjoy for a total of 24 kills and 197 ADR, as well as a rating of 1.39. He was second in rating only to teammate jawgemo , who put on an impressive 1.48 rating on Lotus, the highest single-map rating of the match.

Good luck winning against t3xture when he's doing this.

G2's win is a revenge loss for Masters Shanghai, where the Gen.G easily took down the Americans in 2-0 fashion in the upper bracket final. Curiously enough, G2 also picked Lotus that time — and lost it 13-8 after starting off 7-0 down — and Icebox was also the decider, although it wasn't necessary back then.

Gen.G's elimination comes exactly one year and 10 days after they bested G2 in China.

It's also the end of an unceremonious first-half of the year for Gen.G. They missed out Bangkok altogether earlier this year, placing third at Kickoff, and were stunned by Rex Regum Qeon Rex Regum Qeon Asia-Pacific Rank #6 Monyet Cahya Nugraha xffero David Monangin Jemkin Maksim Batorov Kushy Bryan Carlos Setiawan crazyguy Ngô Công Anh in the grand final of the Pacific league after a near-spotless Stage 1.

For G2, this win almost feels like the team is just getting started. Just over three months ago, the Americas champions were losing the Masters Bangkok grand final to T1 T1 Korea Rank #3 stax Kim Gu-taek (김구택) Meteor Kim Tae-oh (김태오) Sylvan Go Young-sup (고영섭) BuZz Yu Byeong-cheol (유병철) DH Kang Dong-ho (강동호) iZu Ham Woo-ju (함우주) .

Their run in Thailand came off of a perfect regional record and a single-loss in the early stages of the tournament.

This stage, G2 have a near-perfect regional record and have only dropped one match, in the very first round of these playoffs. Now that they've taken one of the biggest scalps in Toronto, the path to the grand final is clear.