With IEM Katowice beginning on January 29, one team is on everyone’s mind. Team Spirit is coming off of wins at the Shanghai Major and now BLAST Spring Bounty. Now, they’re looking to make it three tournament wins in a row.
Start of the Spirit Era?
The current Team Spirit roster rose to the top of the Counter-Strike scene exactly one year ago. With rookie Danil “donk” Kryskovets dropping a nuke at his debut event, Spirit went on to win their first IEM Katowice in the org’s history. That tournament was truly a sight to behold, I know that I was staring at my screen, mouth agape in disbelief half of the time Spirit was playing.
Spirit spent the following months in the awkward Counter-Strike position of everyone else studying and planning specifically to beat them. They did slow down a bit, only clocking in top eights or less at the Copenhagen Major, the Esports World Cup, and IEM Cologne. Still, everyone knew that once Spirit found their momentum again, it was only a matter of time until they bulldozed their way to another trophy.
It just so happened that the event where they did was the most important event of the year: the Perfect World Shanghai Major. Despite teams like NAVI, Vitality, and G2 being heavy favorites to win the crown, it was a donk-propelled Spirit that was able to tear down the competition and claim the Major trophy.
The Sum of Their Parts
Donk ended the Shanghai Major with an absurd 1.67 rating in the Grand Finals, bringing his overall to 1.49. He became the youngest Major winner and MVP in Counter-Strike history, and solidified his bid for HLTV Player of the Year.
Of course, it takes more than just donk to win a Major trophy. Notably, Boris “magixx” Vorobyev had one of the best matches of his life in the Grand Finals against FaZe Clan. He tied donk’s 69 kills over three maps, essentially tied his damage per round, and had a 1.58 rating of his own.
Veteran in-game leader Leonid “Chopper” Vishnyakov went toe-to-toe with arguably the greatest IGL ever in Finn “karrigan” Andersen and held his own. AWPer Dmitriy “sh1ro” Sokolov overcame the adversity of the failed C9 roster and won his piece. And Myroslav “zont1x” Plakhotja joined a very short list of players to win a Major title in their rookie year.
When playing at their peak, Spirit is undeniably the best team in the world. This is a message they want to send as much as possible heading into 2025, and they’ve already started on the right foot.
The Win Streak Begins
Team Spirit absolutely stomped their way through the first event of the new year. They won BLAST Spring Bounty while only dropping a single map overall. The most impressive win of the event was a 2-0 sweep over NAVI in the Semifinals.
Map one was donk doing some donking, going 28-13 with a 1.91 rating on Dust2. On NAVI’s Ancient pick however, the whole squad was required to win the overtime affair. In addition to donk’s 34 kills, sh1ro racked up 35 and chopper 29.
In the Grand Finals against Eternal Fire, sh1ro made himself known. When an AWPer is 78-39, good for a nearly +40 kill differential, you know what kind of a game it was. Even though they lost map one, EF’s Anubis pick, they still dragged it to OT courtesy of sh1ro and zont1x earning 24 kills apiece. Seeing more Spirit members stepping up in big matches against other trophy contenders is exactly what they need to keep the wins coming.
Going for the 2-Time
Spirit now turns their attention to IEM Katowice and they’re in great form, topping our power rankings. As the 2024 victors, they have a crown to defend, and plenty of hungry challengers ready to grab it. If they were to defend their title, it would be only the second time in Counter-Strike history, nearly a decade after Fnatic did it in 2015 and 2016.
It is readily apparent that Team Spirit has what it takes to make it happen. Donk and sh1ro are both in form. Chopper and coach Sergey “hally” Shavayev seem to have figured out how to consistently enable their stars despite being counter-stratted by the best teams in the world. As long as magixx and zont1x are fulfilling their roles, this Spirit squad has few weaknesses to take advantage of.
