Ninjas in Pyjamas rally to win IEM Cologne opener

Ninjas in Pyjamas rallied for a 2-1 win over HEROIC as the play-in round of the Intel Extreme Masters Cologne event got underway Wednesday in Germany.

The play-in phase of the $1 million Counter-Strike: Global Offensive tournament features 16 teams competing in a double-elimination bracket of best-of-three matches. Eight teams will earn spots in the group stage, which also will include eight teams that received direct berths: Team Vitality, MOUZ, Team Spirit, Team Falcons, The MongolZ, Aurora Gaming, G2 Esports and Natus Vincere.

The group stage, which begins Saturday, will consist of two double-elimination groups contesting best-of-three matches. The two group winners will advance directly to the semifinals, the two runners-up will move to the quarterfinals as high seeds, and the two third-place teams will head to the quarterfinals as low seeds.

The playoffs, which will start on Aug. 1, will be single elimination. The quarterfinals and semifinals will be best-of-three ahead of the best-of-five final on Aug. 3.

The winning team will receive $400,000, and the runner-up will get $180,000.

On Wednesday, HEROIC opened with a 13-10 victory on Nuke, but Ninjas in Pyjamas rebounded to claim Overpass and Ancient, both by 13-9 scores.

Ukraine's Artem "r1nkle" Moroz paced Ninjas in Pyjamas with 58 kills and a plus-20 kill-death differential. Sweden's Linus "nilo" Bergman and Belarus' Andrey "tN1R" Tatarinovich each had 48 kills for HEROIC.

Only one other opening-round match went to a third map, with FURIA edging FlyQuest. FURIA jumped in front by taking Inferno 13-7, but FlyQuest equalized with a 19-17 double-overtime win on Dust II. FURIA sealed the match with a 13-10 decision on Mirage.

Brazil's Yuri "yuurih" Santos recorded 58 kills and a plus-14 K-D differential for FURIA. Australia's Justin "jks" Savage wound up with 56 kills and a plus-6 K-D differential for FlyQuest.

In the other matches, all of which finished 2-0: FaZe Clan beat BIG, Team Liquid topped paiN Gaming, 3DMAX handled MIBR, GamerLegion got past Complexity, Virtus.pro downed TYLOO and Astralis bested B8.

The Thursday schedule:

Upper-bracket second round (winners advance)

--FaZe Clan vs. Team Liquid

--3DMAX vs. Ninjas in Pyjamas

--GamerLegion vs. Virtus.pro

--Astralis vs. FURIA

Lower-bracket first round

--BIG vs. paiN Gaming

--MIBR vs. HEROIC

--Complexity vs. TYLOO

--B8 vs. FlyQuest

Lower-bracket second round (winners advance)

--Four matches, teams TBA

Intel Extreme Masters Cologne prize pool

1. $400,000

2. $180,000

3-4. $80,000

5-6. $40,000

7-8. $24,000

9-12. $16,000

13-16. $10,000

17-20. $4,500

21-24. $2,500