Paper Rex and Gentle Mates qualify for the VALORANT Masters Santiago Playoffs

VCT Pacific’s Paper Rex and the EMEA group Gentle Friends qualify for VALORANT Masters Santiago Playoffs due to their undefeated Swiss Stage runs.

As a result, their opponents, representatives of America NRG and EMEA Team Liquidmust survive another round of Swiss Stage matches to secure one of the two remaining Playoffs spots.

The first series of the day saw Masters Toronto winner Paper Rex take down reigning VALORANT Champion, NRG, 2-1.

Paper Rex’s map pick, Split, was an incredibly close affair, featuring high-level play and intense gunfights from both teams. PRX’s quick decision-making on defense and NRG punishing their opponent’s aggressive style of play, resulted in a 6-6 halftime score. This feud continued throughout the second half, with Paper Rex fighting and trading kills much better than NRG closing the map. 13-10.

For Pearl, it was NRG’s turn to come out on top despite Paper Rex winning both gun rounds. The first half (7-5) saw NRG’s Adam ‘madam‘ Pampuch tore through his opponents, until he hit consecutive Aces. Third seed VCT Americas then proceeded to melt away PRX site hits in the second half with help from Odin and Operator. In the end, NRG won their map choice 13-10 even in the series.

The final game in Haven felt like a mirror of the second map, but in PRX’s favor. NRG secured both guns, but Paper Rex converted most of the purchase cycles. Pacific’s third seed delivered well-coordinated site hits in its attack (8-4) and a successful rebound in the second half. Despite a heroic last stand from NRG, the ACE from Paper Rex’s Jason’.f0rsakeNSusanto closed the deal 13-11.

The second series treated EMEA fans to a regional match between their second seed Gentle Mates and third seed Team Liquid, where the French outfit pulled out the challenge. 2-0 sweep.

Gentle Mates chose to start this thread Pearla map that its opponent has historically struggled with. However, Team Liquid surprised the regional rival by becoming the first team to play Harbor at Masters Santiago. In the face of this curveball, Gentle Mates took a few rounds to figure out how to deal with controller usage. The French organization settled in the first half (6-6), but then they looked comfortable in their attacking side to win the map. 13-11.

This momentum carried over to Bind, despite being one of Team Liquid’s strongest maps. After a shot win and a great shot from in-game leader (IGL) Patryk’star‘ Kopczyński, Gentle Mates had an almost flawless attacking half at 2-10. To make matters worse, Team Liquid lost heavily after winning a shootout in the second half. Locking down all of Team Liquid B’s site pushers, Gentle Mates stole the Bind 13-3.

Gentle Friends ‘Martin’marteen‘ Pátek brought a masterclass to Yoru on both maps. Thanks to the amazing break, combined with cold decision-making, marteen achieved a KDA of 48/25/11 and an ACS of 319.

After their recent victory, Paper Rex and Gentle Mates have become the first Swiss Stage competitors to qualify for the VALORANT Masters Santiago Playoffs.

Meanwhile, NRG and Team Liquid must prove themselves in the final round of Swiss Stage games. On March 4, they will face the winners of the lower middle round Edward Games again T1as well as XLG Esports again G2 Sports.

Fans can catch the entire event live via the VALORANT Champions Tour’s Twitch and YouTube channels.