IEM Rio 2023 playoffs preview and predictions

IEM Rio 2023 is about to enter the playoffs stage. Only six of the initial 16 teams are left and the matches look very exciting.

In the quarterfinals, FURIA Esports will play against Heroic, while BIG will need to defeat Team Vitality. The winners will move on to face even bigger challenges in the semifinals.

FURIA Esports vs. Heroic

In theory, FURIA wouldn’t have much of a chance against Heroic. The two teams played against each other at IEM Rio Major, back in November 2022. Heroic won that match and qualified for the Grand Final. However, a lot has changed since then.

In the group stage of IEM Rio 2023, we saw FURIA beating both Fnatic (19-15) and FaZe Clan (2-0) before getting defeated by Cloud9 in a very close match (1-2). Meanwhile, Heroic looked a bit shaky. They nearly lost against 9INE (16-12) and then were beaten by BIG (1-2).

In the lower bracket, they survived by defeating two relatively teams that are arguably weaker than FURIA: The MongolZ (2-1) and Ninjas in Pyjamas (2-0).

These results suggest that FURIA have an excellent chance to win this match. Not only are they in great shape. Their opponents show signs of weakness and the audience will be fully on their side, cheering from start to finish. In the Jeunesse Arena, their screams and songs are guaranteed to boost FURIA’s performance significantly.

BIG vs. Team Vitality

BIG played surprisingly well in the group stage and were only defeated by Natus Vincere. The match between the two teams started with a 20-22 score on Mirage, a map on which Na’Vi struggled to find breaches in their defense.

Before encountering Na’Vi in the upper bracket final, BIG defeated MOUZ (16-6) and Heroic (1-2).

Despite the clear determination demonstrated by the German squad, Team Vitality will be very hard to stop in this match. We saw what Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut and Lotan “Spinx” Giladi were able to do against their group stage opponents, and based on those performances, Vitality have at least a 60% chance to win this match.

Top favorites

Overall, the top favorites of IEM Rio 2023 are Natus Vincere, FURIA Esports, and Team Vitality. Looking at how Na’Vi have played in the groups, we have good reason to believe that they are now back to the level they had back when they had Kirill “Boombl4” Mikhaylov as their IGL.

It’s been almost a year since they won their last S-tier trophy and this tournament is probably their best opportunity since the start of the new season.

Header: ESL