Natus Vincere have booked their spot in the StarSeries i-League Season 4 playoffs after beating Heroic 2-1 (16-14 on Train, 11-16 on Mirage and 16-4 on Overpass).

The second match of the day kicked off on Train, HEROIC's map pick, with Natus Vincere securing their CT pistol thanks to an impressive quad-kill from Oleksandr "⁠s1mple⁠" Kostyliev. A bomb plant then gave the Danes some money to work with, but it was only in the fifth round that they managed to get their first on the board.

A scrappy period of the game then followed, with the trading blows for six rounds in a row, but as HEROIC strung two rounds together, Natus Vincere's economy was in shambles. The Danish team continued playing at a high pace, bringing the deficit to just one round.

Natus Vincere came out of the break with all guns blazing and quickly bagged the pistol round. However, the Nordic squad immediately shut them down with a B-stack, and followed that up with both anti-ecos and a gun round to pick up an 11-9 lead.

That was when Natus Vincere won their first round with guns on the T-side, which marked the beginning of a five-round streak from them. HEROIC still tried to get back into the game and equalised the score at 14-14, but the Ukrainians bagged the final two rounds of regulation to close out the map with a victory.

Natus Vincere are through to the playoffs in Kiev

Now playing on their opponents' map pick, Mirage, HEROIC got off to a good start as they secured the initial three rounds as Terrorists. Danylo "⁠Zeus⁠" Teslenko's men went on to level up the score at 3-3 after buying up, but then the Danes responded on a very weak buy.

Natus Vincere immediately reset their economy, however, and kept denying HEROIC's executions with a very tight defence to pick up a dominant 11-4 half-time lead.

Still, Marco "⁠Snappi⁠" Pfeiffer's team would not back down, and began the second half with a triumphant CT pistol to bring the deficit to 7-11. HEROIC carried that momentum into the gun rounds and constantly kept Natus Vincere's at bay, eventually taking the map with a flawless CT side.

s1mple led the way for Na`Vi with 72 kills

Starting out as Terrorists on the decider map, Overpass, HEROIC picked up the pistol round but could not follow that up. They would redeem themselves with a quad-kill from Jakob "⁠JUGi⁠" Hansen to equalize the game at 2-2, and then grabbed the lead with four more kills from the 20-year-old.

After that, Na`Vi set up a tight defense, ending the half with an eight-round winning streak as they closed down the sites really well and gave HEROIC very little room for manoeuvre.

With a flawless B execution in the second pistol, Natus Vincere found some breathing room, but then s1mple and Denis "⁠electroNic⁠" Sharipov clutched a 2v4 situation to keep their team in the driving seat. It would not take long for Zeus' men to wrap things up, securing a 2-1 win that puts them through to the next stage.

StarSeries i-League Season 4Best of 3 HEROICMatchpage 1 2 21st February 2018 Natus Vincere 14Train 16 16Mirage 11 4Overpass 16

HEROIC	K - D	+/-	ADR	Rating 2.0
Jakob 'JUGi' HansenJUGi	63 - 50	+13	81.6	1.23
Nikolaj 'niko' Kristensenniko	58 - 53	+5	75.9	1.16
Marco 'Snappi' PfeifferSnappi	47 - 55	-8	72.1	0.98
Andreas 'MODDII' FridhMODDII	43 - 55	-12	70.8	0.89
Ruben 'RUBINO' VillarroelRUBINO	43 - 57	-14	61.0	0.78

Natus Vincere	K - D	+/-	ADR	Rating 2.0
Oleksandr 's1mple' Kostylievs1mple	72 - 46	+26	91.5	1.42
Denis 'electroNic' SharipovelectroNic	56 - 53	+3	85.9	1.12
Ioann 'Edward' SukharievEdward	48 - 54	-6	71.8	0.98
Egor 'flamie' Vasilyevflamie	49 - 50	-1	67.3	0.94
Danylo 'Zeus' TeslenkoZeus	44 - 51	-7	64.4	0.92

elow you can find the current standings of the Swiss stage:

Qualified
FaZe	3-0
G2	3-0
Liquid	3-1
Astralis	3-1
SK	3-1
Renegades	3-2
Natus Vincere	3-2
2-2
Cloud9
MOUZ
Eliminated
HellRaisers	2-3
HEROIC	2-3
Gambit	1-3
TYLOO	1-3
Virtus.pro	1-3
fnatic	0-3
MVP PK	0-3