By the time you’re reading this, the Major will be underway. Stage 1 has one of the greatest variances in competitiveness that I’ve ever seen in any Major stage since the playoffs of Paris. As the dust there settles, we’ll be looking toward the second stage. Several household names grace this portion of the tournament, but we have a couple of underdogs as well.
These eight teams—Falcons, FaZe, 3DMAX, Virtus.Pro, paiN, FURIA, MIBR, and M80—are all coming into Stage 2 with different expectations and goals. This list is ordered from teams who would be able to shrug off the results most easily if disaster befalls them. The final teams will find themselves in agony if they don’t make it through to Stage 3 or even the Major playoffs. Let’s get into it:
M80
The American core has bizarrely cratered throughout 2025. Beginning the year with a broken leg for reck meant that they were unable to attain significant practice with their five-man lineup until his return in February. Since he was reinstated, the only notable teams that M80 have defeated in a four-month span are Wildcard, FURIA, paiN, and FlyQuest. They failed to defeat a single Top-50 European opponent in the six attempts they had. There were admittedly some close map-three bouts with G2, Virtus.Pro, and SAW, but they’ve been cleanly outclassed by rosters they felt competitive with just last year.
It’s fair to say that M80 has already achieved their goal of making it to the Major this season, which will keep the dream alive moving forward, but there are zero expectations of them doing any damage with the caliber of opposition that’s already qualified for this stage—and the likely risers who will punch up from Stage 3. Additionally, they are the only team in this stage to have three or more Major rookies (Lake, Swisher, and reck).
MIBR
In February, MIBR made an unprecedented shift away from drop as in-game leader and back to exit, who held the role previously. When the move took place, they were ranked #19 on HLTV. Today, they are at #18. This may seem like a net zero, but there has been a marginal uptick, which showed up at PGL Astana. Defeating G2, paiN, and Virtus.Pro secured their first playoff berth since ESL Pro League 20 in September of last year. That’s a pretty nice drought to break.
However, it would be fairly unsurprising for this roster to crash out of this event, given the season they’ve played. It’s impossible not to mention insani every single time someone brings up MIBR, but weirdly enough, no one on the team—including him—was able to even hold an above-1.00 K/D at an event they did well at. It feels like this team is at least one roster move away from really punching into the top 16 consistently, so success in Austin already feels unlikely.
3DMAX
Despite being one of my favorite tactical teams of late 2024 and early 2025, this roster has seemingly sputtered out. I enjoy watching the occasional set piece from them, but watching this team try to play any style that isn’t laid out in the most well-rehearsed and drilled strategy shows the cracks in the foundation. Maka has done a great job covering up the weaknesses in all of the players on this roster in the past, but 3DMAX are no longer the wildcard underdogs. People understand how they want to approach every game with a rigid style.
The bodyy move I will still argue was an upgrade for these guys. Their floor is higher than it was last year. Due to their slow slippage, the most concerning aspect regarding 3DMAX is that they are tied at 26 for second-oldest team in this stage, along with FURIA (who technically edge them out by 0.1 years older on average).
paiN
The addition of dgt really grabbed everyone’s interest… for all of one month. The slew of mishaps that have befallen paiN recently really sucked the excitement out of a roster move that, on paper, made a lot of sense and should still be an upgrade. dgt is a more proficient player than kauez in almost every sense, other than not being a native Portuguese speaker.
The fact that they had to use their coach in two of the three tournaments since signing dgt would indicate to some that they have not had the reps necessary to make a deep run, but I would argue that the skill on their team should warrant higher expectations than the rosters I’ve listed before paiN here. The talk of biguzera being one of the best fragging IGLs has slowly faded, the hype around dav1deuS has lightly simmered, and this new acquisition of dgt was supposed to already bear fruit.
paiN’s underachievement should be noted, but I would still favor their chances over the Stage 3 hopefuls and some of the rosters already qualified for Stage 2.
FURIA
YEKINDAR and molodoy worked. The Tier 1 debut for molodoy proved wildly successful for FURIA and how they look as a roster moving forward. I am actually excited by them now. They still have some learning to do, as shown in their poor run in Melbourne, but losing to The Mongolz and GamerLegion is exactly where the previous iteration would have failed—so no harm.
I want to see progress. FURIA should want to see progress. With time spent together between tournaments and the ability to bootcamp, they have the preparation and reps needed to learn who they’re trying to be. Now, it’s time to prove that the move to international was one that will at least merit results. I might actually believe paiN to be the better overall team than FURIA in several months’ time—but the pressing matter for FURIA is that they turned their back on some of their most passionate fans in deciding to shift to an English-speaking international roster. They have to show that the decision to leave part of Brazil behind will at least merit wins.
FaZe
I know, I know—this is the part of the video where things get a bit more controversial. How could FaZe, with three players vying for GOAT status, not find an exit in Stage 2 an utter disaster? Well, let’s be brutally honest with ourselves regarding this team: they only switched their AWPer one tournament ago. They did not get to play with their anchor, rain, in that previous tournament. rain is still learning to be an anchor, which he practically never did in his life before, with the exception of a couple of spots.
This FaZe team is realistically in no position to be competing for a title in Austin. If they lose here 2-3, it will look very bad for these individuals, but the expectations of FaZe the org often precede the expectations of the actual roster we have at hand. There may still be a strong case to keep this five-man lineup together into the second season of 2025. It will besmirch the legacy of several of the players, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it is time to shut down this roster.
Virtus.Pro
This is a team that should disband already. That is why a Stage 2 success could save their season. Technically, that works contrary to “Who Has the Most to Lose?” as the title of this article, but it also means the potential to earn is massive.
I’ve just hated watching this team try to accomplish 3–4 things in a normal T-side round, when a typical team will attempt just one and execute off that. A typical VP round seems to involve taking map control, vacating that map control, retaking that map control, then trying to pull off a split with a lurker who has tried getting some other map control. It’s laborious and ineffective. Whereas MAJ3R from Aurora/Eternal Fire will simplify his stratbook so much that it becomes obvious, it can still be effective. electroNic is just injecting his ego into his strats. If they pull them off, they look amazing, but they have so many points of failure that it generally leads to disaster.
I should be done with this team already after their group stage exit in Astana, but a failure to find three wins in Stage 2 will surely spell the end of this roster.
Falcons
This is entirely the opposite of Virtus.Pro. The kyousuke signing looms on the horizon, and the rumors have bounced between Magisk and TeSeS on the chopping block. Their performances here will be the final data point before the Spirit Academy prodigy joins the Falcons’ ranks. Not only will this tournament determine who is removed, but I also believe Falcons are the second-best team in all of Austin.
The season started slow for them with degster, but things really began to click as he was on the way out the door and, of course, improved further with m0NESY. Falcons failing to qualify to Stage 3 would make them the biggest laughing stock of everyone in the entire CS community. Fingers will be pointed, a player will be cut, and frauds will be named. Because we know Falcons will just spend another six-figure buyout to acquire a new player if things go poorly, everyone has to laugh—as the community knows the days are limited where Falcons are not the world number one.
