Big wins for underdog teams have been the biggest stories so far at ESL Pro League Season 22. However, those stories have finally come to an end as the big dogs brushed them aside, eliminating them from the competition.

The first to fall were HOTU, the Russian team headlined by former Virtus.pro player and IEM Rio 2022 Major winner, David “n0rb3r7” Danielyan.

HOTU had impressed during ESL Pro League Season 22, first advancing from Stage 1 with a 3-0 record before taking down Esports World Cup winners The MongolZ in their opening game of Stage 2. HOTU couldn’t carry that momentum into their next game, though, as Spirit handily beat them in the 1-0 bracket.

FaZe and NAVI Advance to 2-2 Bracket

After falling short to Vitality in their 1-1 game, things wouldn’t get easier for HOTU as they were pitted against NAVI in the 1-2 bracket. NAVI made light work of HOTU to eliminate them from the event with a 13-7 scoreline on Ancient and 13-9 on Train, a series in which Valeriy “b1t” Vakhovskiy dominated. He finished with a 45-24 statline.

The other surprise Stage 1 3-0 team, Inner Circle, were also eliminated in the 1-2 bracket, calling time on what was an impressive debut tournament for them, having just been signed by TNL.

Inner Circle almost began Stage 2 with a historic upset win, but blamed having to play with the wrong mouse for ultimately coming up short on map three versus Spirit. They then picked up their own win over The MongolZ to go 1-1 in the Swiss stage, but subsequent dominant defeats at the hands of FURIA and FaZe also saw them eliminated with a 1-3 record.

Gentle Mates’ First Tier One Outing Comes to an End

The other underdog team to impress at ESL Pro League Season 22 was Gentle Mates, home of the former Iberian Soul roster that was signed by the French organization in August.

Gentle Mates first caught the eye after taking down G2 in Stage 1, but really grabbed everyone’s attention after they defeated Vitality 2-0 in the opening game of Stage 2.

Despite that win, Gentle Mates couldn’t kick on in the event; they failed to win another map in their three remaining series in Stockholm. They first lost to MOUZ and Aurora, with both of these dominating on Gentle Mates’ own map pick, and were then eliminated by The MongolZ after a hard-fought battle.

That final series saw Gentle Mates fall 13-8 on Inferno after a solid game from Sodbayar “Techno” Munkhbold, but it was his cousin, Azbayar “Senzu” Munkhbold who stole the show as the series was sent to Mirage.

Mirage lasted an incredible 41 rounds, with the final score 22-19 in favour of the Mongolian team. Senzu did the heavy lifting throughout, ending the map on 40 kills, ending the map with ten more kills than the next player.