FaZe Clan follows MiBR example, sends another North American side home

_{Image via Ubisoft/@itsmeerror}

It was a sad day for North America as the region went from TSM FTX’s victory over SI-favorites Team Liquid to the Soniqs losing against Team Empire and both Oxygen and DarkZero being sent home by Brazilian rosters.

FaZe Clan was responsible for the purple-clad squad’s goodbye. For some people, the winner was decided in the match’s map ban phase – Club is one FaZe’s strongest maps, while the series decider, Bank, is arguably their best map. 

However, Gabriel “cameram4n” Hespanhol had a completely different opinion. “They did a really good map veto, they banned Chalet, we expected to pick that, so we picked Kafe. On Clubhouse, that was a good pick because North America has a good Clubhouse, but we were just better.”

Looking at the numbers, it tracks. North American teams have won 10 of the 15 maps played on Clubhouse in the Six Invitational 2022. However, DarkZero Esports couldn’t do anything to stop FaZe Clan. 

The match followed the same script as the one seen in FaZe’s victory over Oxygen Esports in the upper bracket, as the Brazilians converted three of their six attacks, just before taking the map with four successful defenses. 

FaZe’s Jaime “Cyber” Ramos kicked things off with one of the best rounds in the game, as he got the last two kills in brilliant fashion. 

Kafe was a closer contest between both rosters, although the Brazilians always had the upper hand. FaZe Clan went exotic on Kafe’s round four as Leonardo “Astro” Luis picked Caveira. “Before the match started we analyzed them and saw that they tried to cover all the basement floor with four people and only one upstairs so we tried to interrogate the only guy upstairs, but at the end, there wasn’t only one guy, it didn’t go as we expected,” said cameram4n. 

Astro stayed in Cigar for the majority of the round, but while roaming he got caught by Roberto “Panbazou” Feliciano and Nick “njr” Rapier. Regardless of if that was a good idea or not, the round would eventually fall in the hands of FaZe Clan. 

It was on round four of Kafe when we could say that FaZe Clan won the map, as a very sloppy DarkZero Esports pushed Kitchen without the defuser. No plant, no win, as cameram4n just had to stay alive. 

A 4-2 lead was enough for FaZe Clan as the Brazilians didn’t struggle much despite Kafe being more of a defender sided map. The Brazilians would eventually win the map by 7-5 to close out the series. 

With this victory, FaZe Clan has moved to the lower quarterfinals and will have to face the Soniqs in order to advance to the next stage of the bracket. The match will be played on Feb. 18, 7 pm CET.