Sentinels, 100 Thieves qualify for VALORANT Masters: Berlin

The first two North American teams punched their tickets to VALORANT Masters: Berlin with two wins each on the first day of Challengers Playoffs. The first, unsurprisingly, is Sentinels. The other half of the bracket wasn’t such a shoe-in, but in the end, 100 Thieves came out on top and will head to Germany to compete in the last Masters event of the year.

100T started the day facing FaZe Clan, who they easily bested in a 2-0 victory. They went wild on Haven to beat FaZe 13-6, and then went on to win Breeze as well, 13-9.

When it came time to face XSET, they didn’t have it so easy. Joshua “steel” Nissan made a rare KAY/O pick, which XSET admitted was a thorn in their side.

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“I think the KAY/O was really a thorn in our sides. Steel played it really well. It's just anything that's new, that you haven't seen before can catch you off guard,” Rory “dephh” Jackson said.

100T’s victory over XSET was not easily won. In fact, the match started off with XSET running away with the score. The first half of the match ended 9-3 in favor of XSET. Then, 100T woke up.

“I mean, I feel like I was half asleep that first half, I think at one point I pressed tab it was like, 0-10. That didn't help,” Spencer “Hiko” Martin said in a postmatch interview. “Obviously, we still had a very positive mindset coming into the second half. … I mean we did exactly what we were talking about doing. We have a very resilient team ... we may be down big but we could always come back.”

Read more: Meet the teams that have qualified for VALORANT Masters: Berlin

On the other side of the bracket, Sentinels had their way with both teams they faced to earn their spot in Masters: Berlin, but they did have a bit of a struggle with Rise on Ascent. It may have been the case that Sentinels were experimenting with Hunter “SicK” Mims on KAY/O, but Rise ended up taking Ascent from Sentinels, a rare occurrence these days.

On Breeze, Sentinels showed their dominance by crushing Rise 13-3. Although Rise did take a map from them, Sentinels came back in the third map to take the win after the 13-4 victory on Bind.

Although many fans wanted a Sentinels and TSM matchup, Team Envy was the next opponent standing in Sentinels’ way to Germany. These matches were much tighter, both ending in 13-11 victories for Sentinels.

“I think Envy's looking really good, obviously they give us a tough time. Honestly, nobody can say, it's up to who performs on the day of matches. All of these teams are getting really good and nothing is free,” Shahzeb “ShahZam” Khan said after the match.

Rise, TSM, XSET, Team Envy, Luminosity and FaZe Clan will all now have to fight through the lower bracket for the last remaining Masters: Berlin spot.

XSET and Team Envy start one match ahead of the rest due to the seeding in the upper bracket, and will face the winners of the first two lower bracket matches tomorrow.

Sentinels and 100T will face off in the upper bracket final to determine who goes into the grand final with a map pick advantage. The lower bracket final and the grand final will be a best-of-five match to determine the winner of Challengers Stage 3 playoffs.

Lead photo credit: Riot Games