G2 Esports is the IEM Katowice 2023 champion

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G2 Esports beats Heroic to win the IEM Katowice 2023 championship.

G2 Esports won the Intel Extreme Masters event in Katowice, Poland, by defeating Heroic 3-1 in the best-of-five grand final on Sunday.

Champions, G2 Esports remained unbeaten in a showdown between the tournament’s two top teams, both of whom had won their respective groups in the previous round to secure byes into the semifinals, to win the $400,000 first prize and an automatic place into the $1 million IEM Cologne event this summer.

Heroic accepted a second-place award of $180,000.

G2 seized a 2-0 lead with two close victories, 16-12 on Nuke and 16-13 on Mirage. Heroic went on the board first, defeating Inferno 16-11, but G2 sealed the title by defeating Ancient 16-7.

G2 was led by Nemanja “huNter-” Kovac of Bosnia & Herzegovina, who had 82 kills and a plus-18 kills-to-deaths differential. Australia’s Justin “jks” Savage came in second with 80 kills and a plus-18 rating, tying his teammate.

Denmark’s Casper “cadiaN” Moller led Heroic with 75 kills and a plus-7, the team’s only player with a positive K-D.

The $1 million Counter-Strike: Global Offensive competition kicked off on February 1 with a 16-team, double-elimination play-in round to select the remaining eight slots in the group stage. All first-round play-in matches were best-of-three, while all other play-in matches were best-of-three.

From Saturday through Tuesday, two eight-team groups competed in a double-elimination style of best-of-three matches. G2 and Heroic, the group winners, proceeded to the single-elimination playoff semifinals. The runners-up in each group, Natus Vincere and Team Vitality, advanced to the playoff quarterfinals as high seeds, while Team Liquid and Outsiders advanced as low seeds.