To say the BLAST.tv Austin Major playoff bracket is stacked is an understatement. The bracket represents one of the strongest line-ups in major history, with only Falcons and Aurora preventing the teams from perfectly aligning with the world ranking Top 8.
So let’s take a look at how the playoff bracket might shape up.
Spirit vs MOUZ
Defending champions, Spirit, have not dropped a series since their BLAST Rivals defeat to Vitality in May. In winning PGL Astana, the Russian org has shown that they are still championship quality despite being overshadowed by Vitality’s potential era-defining year.
Yet to drop a map at the major, Spirit defeated paiN, Lynn Vision, and Na’Vi in 2-0 fashion on their way to the playoffs with Danil ‘donk’ Kryshkovets dropping a 44-26 series K/D. Spirit’s 2025 has certainly shown some frailty at times, with the roster’s strength in depth lacking in comparison to Vitality’s, but donk’s destroyers have not shown weakness yet in Austin.
By contrast, MOUZ survived a 0-2 Stage 3 start, as they lost to Virtus.pro and FaZe, before recovering to beat Liquid, Aurora and Legacy, all in 2-1 fashion. Typically, the kings of the studio, and shying away in arenas, MOUZ have not shown their typical level in Austin as of yet. They will have to raise their level massively to make it to the semis.
Prediction: Spirit
FURIA vs paiN
After years of stagnation, FURIA have finally made the bold call of looking outside of Brazil for solutions to their historic roster problems. The move meant a change to English comms, but surprisingly, there doesn’t seem to be anything lost in translation as FURIA made it through Stage 3 in 3-0 fashion.
Most shockingly of all, Gabriel ‘FalleN’ Toledo has given up his AWP to Kazahk young-gun Danil ‘molodoy’ Golubenko. Neither have looked out of place for a second despite their inexperience with rifling and tier one CS, respectively.
Despite an abject IGLing stint in Liquid that threatened to derail his entire career, Mareks ‘YEKINDAR’ Gaļinskis’s ceaseless aggression has proved to be the perfect tonic for a FURIA roster whose rifling stars prefer to have impact in the late-round. Overall, this FURIA looks much more fundamentally sound than any FURIA in recent memory.
paiN scraped into the playoff bracket by defeating Virtus.pro by the finest of margins. Despite this exact five playing one (1) match together before the major, paiN IGL Rodrigo ‘biguzera’ Bittencourt has once again conjured magic to perform above expectations and reach the org’s first ever major playoffs. While the roster has looked weaker than FURIA so far, it’s a local derby, so who knows what could happen?
Prediction: Furia
Natus Vincere vs Vitality
The team of 2024 vs the team of 2025. In 2024, Na’Vi were a Shanghai Major trophy away from defining their own era in CS2, yet they failed even to make the playoffs. Vitality has already gone further than that, and their era (with six consecutive trophies in a row) has also been more convincing and dominant.
Fans and pundits alike feared for the worst when Vitality dropped Inferno 13-3 to Legacy to go 0-1 in Stage 3, but Vitality have looked fully themselves since. Frankly, it’s hard to point out a weakness in this Vitality team who are full of star power from bottom to top.
It seems inevitable that Vitality will capture their era in Austin, and with that Team Vitality’s British anchor William ‘mezii’ Merriman will be part of an era-defining team.
By contrast, Na’Vi have not looked like the same team as last year. While the opposition have taken steps forward and improved their firepower, Na’Vi seem to have regressed in what made them the best team in the world in 2024 – teamplay. The roster looks disconnected inside and outside the server. Na’Vi will be looking for the perfect game plan from coach Andrey ‘B1ad3’ Gorodenskiy, and the perfect execution from the roster if they hope to recapture Copenhagen’s magic.
Prediction: Vitality
FaZe vs The MongolZ
FaZe defeated The MongolZ to reach playoffs, and will now face and immediately rematch from their perspective. For The MongolZ, they showed incredible fight and determination in their five overtime defeat of G2 to secure playoffs at the final opportunity, but their defeat to a FaZe who have barely had a month together shows that their game is not at their brilliant best.
By contrast, it seemed for so much of this year that the season was simply going to pass FaZe by with very little fanfare. FaZe looked like a shadow of themselves for much of the year, with no discernible playstyle and no appreciable honeymoon ‘FaZe’ from signing Jonathan ‘EliGE’ Jablonowski. Somehow, FaZe with Oleksandr ‘s1mple’ Kostyljev have refound themselves in Austin.
The question of how far you think FaZe can make it in playoffs is a question of how romantic you are. If you believe that vibes can carry FaZe into their third consecutive major final, if you believe that s1mple can conjure his best game after months on the sidelines, if you believe that EliGE can lift a long-sought-after major trophy in front of his home crowd, then I cannot say you are wrong. Just a dreamer.
FaZe are, perhaps, the most romantic team in Counter-Strike after all.
Prediction: FaZe
Tournament Prediction
The predictions above lead to Furia vs FaZe and Vitality vs Spirit semis. FURIA vs FaZe should be a barnburner, if not a bit sloppy. Vitality vs Spirit, the final of IEM Katowice 2025, may prove to be the most definitive match of the major. With both teams being together for the whole year, and attempting to peak in the major, it should prove to be a high-quality contest.
Predictions: Faze & Vitality
Such a scenario would lead to what ZywOo described in the interview as the “Messi vs Ronaldo” of Counter-Strike, with s1mple and Mathieu ‘ZywOo’ Herbaut reigniting their rivalry on the biggest stage possible. One can only dream. Yet with Vitality looking nearly flawless this year, it is hard to see them losing to a team who have had so little time to develop their map pool, protocols and team synergy.
Grand-Final Prediction: Vitality
CS community talent Pick’ems reveal potential path
Twitter/X account @CS2News_EN collated “Over 100 tier 1-2 players, casters, analysts and other influencers” BLAST.tv Austin Major Playoff predictions to create an image of who the Counter-Strike world was backing for the major. It seems that most believe in the s1mple and ZywOo clash, with 48.51% and 26.73% backing Vitality and FaZe, respectively.
Bottom of the list is Natus Vincere with less than 1% of Pick’ems backing them to win. They do start their playoff run versus Vitality, so that’s not a huge surprise, yet they were also the least fancied team at PGL Copenhagen and we know how that ended…
Well, you know my thoughts, but what do the odds say? Check out our CS2 betting partners to see the latest Esports Betting Odds.
Darragh Harbinson is an esports writer specialising in Counter-Strike. He has written for Esports News UK, Esports Insider, UKCSGO, Dexerto, and Rush B Media.
