What are the odds of us getting to see another full five-game Dota 2 series so soon after the last one? Pretty high, apparently, as that’s exactly what went down in the grand finals of PGL Wallachia Season 6 just now.
We got five games of pure cinema like we did at BLAST Slam 4, and I have to say: it’s great seeing two grand final matches in a row go the distance. It’s a refreshing sight considering the multiple 3-0 results of the Gaimin Gladiators era, and should hopefully help competitive Dota 2 grow further.
We all got treated to a slugfest in the first game of this series, both teams coming out swinging with zero hesitation. MOUZ had control of most of this game, thanks in no small part to them getting their hands on Naga Siren for Oleh “kaori” Medvedok (standing in for Melchior “Seleri” Hillenkamp), Tidehunter for Miroslav “BOOM” Bičan, and Jakiro for Daniyal “yamich” Lezebnyy.
This draft set them up for some serious firepower in teamfights, which they leveraged throughout the majority of the game to keep Spirit on the back foot. There was even a teamfight where BOOM mistimed his Ravage (R) into kaori’s Song of the Siren (R), but it ended up not even mattering because the Song actually helped yamich set up Ice Path (W) right after.
ULTIMATE GLIMPSE BY @PANTOMEMA 😍 pic.twitter.com/Zek4UO7aEU
— Team Spirit Dota 2 (@TSpirit_Dota2) November 23, 2025
Things were looking up for MOUZ heading into the late game as a result, but you really just can’t have anything nice against Spirit if the game does go late. Where do I even begin here? Maybe with Magomed “Collapse” Khalilov, who started the comeback by stealing the Aegis of the Immortal right in front of MOUZ’ faces as Centaur Warrunner at the 32 and a half minute mark. Oh, and there’s also the Work Horse (F) saves from Collapse in clutch moments.
Or perhaps I should start with Illya “Yatoro” Mulyarchuk, who helped stabilize Spirit’s dire situation with his incredible carry play and better scaling compared to Remco “Crystallis” Arets’ Troll Warlord. Or, maybe I should instead talk about Nikita “panto” Balaganin’s play as Disruptor, regularly breaking up MOUZ’ rhythm in teamfights and preventing them from using Black King Bar when they needed to.
Honestly, this was just the entirety of Spirit at their best. They just do their best work when their backs are against the wall, and they just find ways to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. They played the late game in this one almost flawlessly, and were rewarded for it with a massive comeback and statement win.
There’s a really good reason why Warlock is kaori’s sixth most played hero at the professional level, and Spirit learned exactly why that is in game 2. Things were relatively even between both teams in this game, with MOUZ getting most of their comfort heroes and Spirit opting to experiment a little by grabbing Riki for Aleksandr “rue” Filin.
The Riki pick didn’t really work as well as they might have hoped, but as you can imagine from the first paragraph, that wasn’t really the reason why they lost this game. It was because of an absolutely massive Fatal Bonds (Q) and Chaotic Offering (R) combination from kaori during a teamfight near the Radiant Roshan pit.
It was truly anyone’s game up until that point, though it was tilting towards Spirit’s side as they were actually winning this particular teamfight. But the amount of damage that came out from kaori’s Warlock in the sequence mentioned above made me yell out loud at 11pm in Manila, possibly disturbing my neighbors in the process.
What was a 5,000 gold lead in favor of Team Spirit instantly evaporated as a result, and MOUZ were quick to capitalize by taking the fight straight to Spirit from there. And with Crystallis’ Troll Warlord being quite farmed at this point, it was just a matter of running at Spirit’s heroes and cleaving them down.
Not wanting to be outdone by the stand-in, game 3 was yamich’s turn to turn up the heat — of course, as his signature Tusk. This game in particular was very back-and-forth between both teams. And when Spirit were winning some seemingly impossible teamfights in the mid game, I thought that they were about to pull off one of their patented comebacks after losing the laning phase as hard as they did.
Spirit getting the Aegis at around the 32 minute mark made me believe in the comeback even harder, especially given that Yatoro was playing Morphling in this game. But like I alluded to above, yamich had other ideas. Even knowing that Spirit had the momentum, he and the rest of MOUZ were bold enough to go up to Spirit’s high ground in the middle lane, which I personally thought was quite hasty by them.
But even as Spirit tried to defend their tier 3 tower, nearly killing Crystallis’ Juggernaut in the process, yamich knew exactly what he had to do: get a clutch Snowball (W) save on his carry. It came just in the nick of time with Crystallis at extremely low health, and the save proved to be the one thing that finally broke Spirit’s backs.
With no buyback on Yatoro, Spirit just didn’t have the damage output that they needed in order to repel MOUZ’ advance.
Facing elimination, Team Spirit dug deep into their bag of tricks in game 4, and ran MOUZ completely out of the building in order to tie the series.
It started with the draft, particularly with the Underlord and Bounty Hunter picks for Collapse and rue respectively. These two picks were instrumental in disrupting MOUZ’ rhythm in teamfights, something that MOUZ just had a hard time dealing with considering their own draft. Dragon Knight, Mars, Queen of Pain, Warlock, and Clockwerk all hate playing against such widespread vision and control, especially against Pit of Malice (W).
MULTI-TEAM WIPE 😉🤙 pic.twitter.com/wqkGqbaPh9
— Team Spirit Dota 2 (@TSpirit_Dota2) November 23, 2025
Likewise, they also banned yamich’s Tusk, which was just getting way too annoying for them to not respect in the draft. They let the Warlock through for kaori to pick up, but kaori really didn’t get to have the same amount of impact on the hero that he did in game 2.
Naturally, stabilizing the lanes also helped Spirit keep pace with MOUZ throughout this game. Whereas they were losing the lanes pretty handily in the previous two losses, they made sure to lock in nicely in this one so that they didn’t find themselves in a really deep hole in the first 15 minutes.
Such a smart draft adjustment on the part of coach Airat “Silent” Gaziev resulted in a total stomp in Spirit’s favor, and the one game in this series (at least up to this point) that didn’t feel like it could swing one way or the other.
Despite the possibility of a disappointing second place finish hanging over their heads, MOUZ seemingly knew exactly what they had to do in order to close this series out and walk away as PGL Wallachia Season 6 champions. Well, I say that, but honestly, it was more like BOOM knowing exactly what to do, particularly as Timbersaw.
He was by far the biggest difference maker in this game, especially against Yatoro’s Morphling, Denis “Larl” Sigitov’s Dragon Knight, and Collapse’s Underlord. The way he was just eviscerating Yatoro in particular helped the rest of his team keep him at bay, while the rest of Spirit simply folded to the sheer burst damage coming out from MidOne’s Slardar and Crystallis’ Monkey King.
It felt like there were 15 minutes in between the end of the midgame and the late game where Team Spirit didn’t win a single teamfight. And even though they tried to kill off BOOM in one last-ditch effort at around the 42 minute mark, MOUZ were just clicking too much in order to let this one slip. Jumping Timbersaw first was never going to be advisable, but I honestly don’t think doing anything else would have been enough anyway.
And so, MOUZ are your PGL Wallachia Season 6 champions, and what a story for this team. I mean, it’s five “rejects” banding together to revive the MOUZ brand in Dota 2 and winning their first LAN together so early in the new season. They also did this without their captain Seleri (and momentarily, without Crystallis), and now kaori will surely get a ton of contract offers from a bunch of different teams looking for a position 5 player.
And as for coach Daniel “ImmortalFaith” Moza, this proves that he is now one of the best coaches in the entire scene, after trying with so, so many clubs in the past.
They couldn’t get it done at Singapore, but they have made up for it big time in Bucharest. It’s going to be extremely exciting seeing what heights this squad can reach in the near future.
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