Ukrainian esports team NAVI reaches sixth final in row, approaching their own record

Ukrainian esports organisation Natus Vincere (NAVI) has secured its sixth consecutive final appearance in Counter-Strike 2 competitions. In a thrilling semi-final at IEM Rio 2024, the team triumphed over Norway's Heroic, advancing to the final of a prestigious cyber sports competition once again.

Source: Champion, a sports news platform within Ukrainska Pravda’s holding company

Details: This achievement puts NAVI on the verge of breaking their own record of seven consecutive finals, set in 2021, while also positioning them to potentially match the remarkable feat of another esports team, FaZe, which reached eight finals in the 2023-24 season.

Another team, Astralis, also holds a noteworthy achievement from 2018-19, when they successfully reached finals seven times in a row.

In the final of IEM Rio 2024, NAVI will face off against the winner of the FURIA vs. MOUZ match. The decisive showdown will be held in a best-of-five format and is scheduled for today, 13 October.

Notably, NAVI's finals results have an intriguing pattern as they win every second decisive match and lose every other. Following this trend, the final in Rio should ideally result in a victory for the Ukrainian team.

Natus Vincere consists of two Ukrainians, a Lithuanian, a Romanian and a Finn:

• Valerii "b1t" Vakhovskyi (Ukraine);
• Justinas "jL" Lekavičius (Lithuania);
• Aleksi "Aleksib" Virolainen (Finland);
• Mihai "iM" Ivan (Romania);
• Ihor "w0nderful" Zhdanov (Ukraine);
• Andrii "B1ad3" Horodenskyi (coach, Ukraine).

Background: On 11 October, NAVI (1) defeated Russia’s Virtus.pro (9) in the Counter-Strike 2 quarter-finals at Intel Extreme Masters (IEM) Rio 2024.

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