G2 Gozen are the VCT EMEA Game Changers 2023 Series 1 Champions
On Sunday, G2 Gozen became the Champions of the first stage of this year’s EMEA Game Changers league after an intense series against BBL Queens.
G2 Gozen are continuing their legacy of being the winningest team in all of VCT Game Changers with this first major 2023 victory. The squad took home the World Championship trophy last year after taking down the best of the best from around the globe, and they have historically dominated in their home region — with the exception of the final regional series of 2022, which was ripped away from them by Guild X. Going into the new year, G2 Gozen actually welcomed one of their former Guild X rivals into the fold, adding Vivan “roxi” Schilling to the roster in place of Julia “juliano” Kiran, who retired from professional VALORANT to return to CS:GO on the G2 Oya squad.
BBL Queens, meanwhile, are an all-Turkish squad who entered the EMEA Game Changers scene in September of last year when they competed in that series’ open qualifiers. They were ultimately knocked out in the lower bracket, but they came back even stronger this year, qualifying into the main league and making an incredible run to claim their spot in the grand finals. They went fully undefeated through their entire time in VCT Game Changers 2023 Series I until their final battle with G2 Gozen, taking down 10 other teams — including G2 in two best-of-three’s during the group stage and the playoffs.
Unfortunately for BBL Queens, G2’s experience in best-of-fives ultimately came through to help them over the finish line in this tournament, which they took 3-2. G2 snagged the first two maps, securing Pearl 13-5 and Ascent 15-13. BBL managed to rally and take two maps for themselves — Lotus 13-9 and Split 13-5. The decider map was Fracture, which G2 managed to take convincingly with a 13-9 scoreline.
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