The Pacific Stage 2 playoffs continued today with play-ins squads ONSIDE GAMING ONSIDE GAMING Korea Rank #5 Xiesta Jung Si-hwan (정시환) loan Hermes Ahn Byeong-wook (안병욱) Ray Oh Eun-hyuk (오은혁) Cloudy Koo Min-jae (구민재) Wolverine Cho Hyun-tae (조현태) and T1 T1 Korea Rank #2 stax Kim Gu-taek (김구택) Meteor Kim Tae-oh (김태오) BuZz Yu Byeong-cheol (유병철) DH Kang Dong-ho (강동호) iZu Ham Woo-ju (함우주) Munchkin Byeon Sang-beom (변상범) joining the fray in the first round of the lower bracket. Paper Rex Paper Rex Asia-Pacific Rank #1 invy Adrian Jiggs Reyes Jinggg Wang Jing Jie f0rsakeN Jason Susanto d4v41 Khalish Rusyaidee something Ilya Petrov and T1 achieved convincing 2-0 victories over ONSIDE and KIWOOM DRX KIWOOM DRX Korea Rank #6 MaKo Kim Myeong-gwan (김명관) free1ng No Ha-jun (노하준) HYUNMIN Song Hyun-min (송현민) Flicker Kim Tae-hee (김태희) BeYN Kang Ha-bin (강하빈) respectively, putting an end to their opponents' 2026 seasons and making Champions Shanghai the first Champions without KRX since the team's inception.

Paper Rex sends ONSIDE GAMING away in swift 2-0

As the only Challengers team to make it out of play-ins, ONSIDE were immediately faced with a major challenge in the form of Paper Rex, who had just descended to the lower bracket following a loss to Nongshim RedForce Nongshim RedForce Korea Rank #1 WoohyuN Moon Woo-hyun (문우현) Xross Jeonghwan (정환) Rb Goo Sang-min (구상민) Francis Kim Mu-bin (김무빈) Dambi Lee Hyuk-kyu (이혁규) Ivy Park Sung-hyeon (박성현) earlier in the week.

ONSIDE chose to open with Abyss, seeking to take advantage of PRX's struggles versus Nongshim and the fact that it was their first time showing the map. PRX made a slight compositional adjustment, moving d4v41 from Astra to Omen, while ONSIDE opted for a Sova-KAY/O double-Initiator look.

ONSIDE's plan seemed effective at first as they assumed a 5-1 lead on the typically less-favored defense side; however, a successful thrifty round late in the half gave PRX a way back into what turned into a 6-6 scoreline. Over in the second half, f0rsakeN made a huge impact for PRX, winning them another thrifty round with a Sheriff 4K and enabling consistent A site floods with his Harbor utility. PRX pressed forward to a 12-9 lead and eventually closed it out 13-11.

Over on Ascent, PRX again adjusted their composition slightly from their last showing, putting Jinggg back on Sage for a Sage-Chamber lineup. Despite having two Sentinels, PRX's attack side was an unstoppable 9-3—d4v41 farmed early picks on Chamber and Jinggg's wall facilitated repeated B splits that ONSIDE could find no answers to.

ONSIDE prolonged the inevitable with a successful force buy before eventually succumbing to the regional titans 13-5, exiting their foray into VCT Pacific with a respectable top eight finish. f0rsakeN led the series with 38 kills and a 1.43 rating.

T1 takes down KRX in 2-0 fashion

Despite immediately entering the lower bracket due to their loss to Nongshim in the play-in stage, T1 looked unfettered versus KRX, standing strong on Lotus and coming out with an impressive Abyss to take a 2-0 victory.

T1 took the first map to Lotus, where they had defeated KRX in their last encounter during the group stage. Over the course of the map, strong starts into the halves and individual clutches proved to be the difference-maker for T1 as they won both pistol rounds, both bonus rounds, and four total clutches, one of which was a 1v3 from stax in the second pistol. KRX kept it close with multiple strings of buy rounds, but it wasn't enough to make up the deficit as T1 took the map 13-10.

Abyss was a Yoru-Waylay mirror matchup with the exception of yong on Cypher versus Munchkin on a more unusual Brimstone pick. While yong turned out to be KRX's best individual performer, Munchkin's Brimstone proved to create major headaches for KRX as T1 strung together eight consecutive attack rounds off of deep lurks and unbreakable postplants.

A failed fake attempt from KRX allowed T1 to take the bonus in the second half, all but putting an end to things as T1 went up 12-4 and later won 13-7. BuZz topfragged the series with a cumulative 47/32/10 KDA; Munchkin had the highest rating of 1.46 and a 37/25/30 KDA.

Up next

The lower bracket action returns tomorrow with two tickets to the finals weekend in Busan on the line. PRX will take on VARREL VARREL Japan Rank #2 Foxy9 Jung Jae-sung (정재성) C1ndeR Ko Jae-hyuk (고재혁) Klaus Kim Min-hyuk (김민혁) XuNa Kim Tae-geon (김태건) oonzmlp Shin Sang-beom (신상범) Zexy Jang Suk-hyun (장석현) in a group stage rematch, while T1 will battle another Korean squad in Gen.G Gen.G Korea Rank #3 Ash Ha Hyun-cheol (하현철) Karon Kim Won-tae (김원태) t3xture Kim Na-ra (김나라) Efina Kim Nak-yeon (김낙연) Raxcal Kim Min-seok (김민석) as their quest for Champions qualification continues.