Esports | CS:GO | Cloud9 — The 22-19 Major Decider at Agganis Arena

On January 28, 2018, Cloud9 and FaZe Clan reached the third map of the ELEAGUE Major: Boston grand final inside Agganis Arena with the series tied. Inferno eventually ended 22–19 for Cloud9 after two overtime periods, turning the last map into the exact place-moment that decided the championship.

This was Counter-Strike: Global Offensive on Windows, not the later Counter-Strike 2. The playoff client was version 1.36.2.3, the January 23 build that enabled the Boston Major playoff bracket, and the event was organized by ELEAGUE as a Valve-sponsored Major rather than as an unaffiliated community tournament.

CS:GO placed five players on each side, alternating between Terrorists trying to plant a bomb and Counter-Terrorists trying to prevent or defuse it. A regulation map was won by reaching 16 rounds before a 15–15 tie; overtime then used six-round blocks, three rounds per side, until one team finished a block with a winning margin.

Cloud9 fielded Tyler “Skadoodle” Latham, Tarik “tarik” Celik, Timothy “autimatic” Ta, Jake “Stewie2K” Yip, and William “RUSH” Wierzba. FaZe answered with Finn “karrigan” Andersen, Ladislav “GuardiaN” Kovács, Håvard “rain” Nygaard, Olof “olofmeister” Kajbjer, and Nikola “NiKo” Kovač.

FaZe took Mirage 16–14, then Cloud9 tied the best-of-three by winning Overpass 16–10. On Inferno, FaZe reached 15 rounds while Cloud9 had 11, but Cloud9 won the remaining regulation rounds to force overtime; the first extra block ended 18–18 before Cloud9 won the second 4–1 for the final 22–19 score.

The 2–1 series victory made Cloud9 the first North American team to win a Valve-sponsored CS:GO Major. Valve recorded the title and the $500,000 first prize, while contemporary match reporting preserves the map sequence, round scores, and lineups.

The pin marks Agganis Arena at 925 Commonwealth Avenue in Boston, where the venue’s own archive places the New Champions Stage from January 26 through 28. Earlier tournament stages were played in Atlanta and are not assigned to this Boston pin.

Sources: Valve’s official “Boston 2018 – Major Champions!” post; Agganis Arena’s event-history and directions pages; HLTV’s January 28 final report and match record; and SteamDB’s archived January 23 client build.

Cover: Agganis Arena at 925 Commonwealth Avenue, photographed by Beyond My Ken on March 1, 2022, via Wikimedia Commons; CC BY-SA 4.0. The photograph shows the arena exterior, not a reconstructed event stage or broadcast frame.