And Then There Were Eight: Paris Major Update

Sixteen teams entered the Paris La Défense Arena, but only eight are still standing. Plenty of upsets have rocked the tournament field, so here’s a recap to get you up to speed as we enter the penultimate game.

Group A

The first group of the Major kicked off with Team Vitality facing off against Wildcard, and Karmine Corp fighting against FUT Esports.

There were some massive Worlds implications for Wildcard, as they needed one series win to give themselves a chance to escape the group and secure the Oceania Worlds spot.

A last-place exit would only give Torsos, Bananahead, and Fever four points, enough to tie but not pass Team PWR, who represented OCE in Boston.

Wildcard were stifled in their opening match against Vitality, however. The EU1 for Paris were able to sweep the Aussies to move to 1-0 in Groups.

Elsewhere, FUT Esports and Karmine Corp were stuck in a dogfight. Justin’s latest team entered as the last team in from North America, but put up a strong showing against the perennially good Karmine Corp, with Vatira and Atow leading the charge.

After a long deadlock, Cheese tapped home the open net 4 minutes into overtime. FUT would double up their series lead on Forbidden Temple, shutting out the Blue Wall 3-0. Karmine Corp came out of the timeout swinging and got a game back with a decisive victory, and then eked out a one-goal win to send the series to Champions Field.

KC would take game 5 in overtime and complete the reverse sweep, giving NA fans an early heartbreak, and the first of many.

Karmine Corp and Team Vitality met for the 35th time in Rocket League Esports history, with 25 of those coming in the RLCS. Karmine Corp is currently 23-12 all time, and 16-9 in series within the RLCS.

While Vitality looked the best they have in a while, Karmine Corp got the best of the rivalry once again, winning it in four games to clinch the top spot in Group A.

FUT got the best of Wildcard, setting up a final clash for second in the group against Team Vitality. After a back-and-forth affair featuring FOUR overtimes, Team Vitality got the series winner, two minutes and twenty two seconds into overtime.

Wildcard were eliminated, setting up a tiebreaker between them and PWR for a spot in Texas.

Group B

Group B actually batted lead-off for the Paris Major competition, with Man City clashing with MIBR, and NRG taking on Five Fears. NRG battled through some equipment issues but ultimately got a quick win over SSA’s lone representative.

Meanwhile, MIBR got off to a quick start before Seikoo and company stormed back and took the next three.

In the second set of matches, MIBR gave NRG quite a scare. NRG didn’t really look like themselves all weekend, and found themselves on the ropes after MIBR took the lead in the series after a quick 8-second overtime in game 3.

Despite trailing in game four, the defending World Champs rallied to force game 5, and won on Champions Field to advance to 2-0 in the Group. Man City easily dispatched Five Fears to go stride for stride with the top seed from NA.

MIBR took their turn to sweep Five Fears and made it out of the group with ease. Five Fears is now 0-6 in series and 0-18 in games at Majors this season.

The real blockbuster matchup of Thursday’s competition was Man City versus NRG, with the winner topping the group. Fans expected a series, and instead got a massacre.

Game one went Man City’s way. Then game two. Then game three. Seikoo’s revenge tour continues to roll, and he’s looking to take it all the way to the Grand Finals Station.

A reeling NRG, who hadn’t really looked in form despite their 2-0 group record, would be forced to make a huge lower bracket run.

Group C

This group was a little more up in the air about who would emerge on top. With Twisted Minds getting the top seed in MENA, Shopify snagging the third spot in NA, and NIP having a recent run of form in Europe across the online portion of the split, it was anyone’s game.

While NIP easily dispatched of TSM, Shopify and NIP were embroiled in a tightly contested series to find out who would be starting off their group with a win.

Shopify gained control of the series early with an overtime win, but Twisted Minds responded with a dominant 5-0 win in the next game. The Rebels fought back and shutout the Twisted offense to regain control of the series, but couldn’t close it out in game 4 overtime, pushing the series to the brink.

One minute into the decider, Firstkiller used a delayed fifty to force Monkey Moon to play it off his car and into the net, giving SR an early lead. TM star Nwpo snuck one in the near post for the equaliser.

After some back and forth, Firstkiller pounced on a loose ball in the box and scored the go-ahead goal with 2 minutes to go. The Rebels hung on and won a thriller to move to 1-0 in the group.

The second set of series in Group C saw Twisted Minds completely dismantle NIP in three games. They outscored NIP 15-6, and their 10 goals in game two were the most goals scored by a single team in RLCS LAN history.

Meanwhile, Shopify Rebellion was caught in yet another barn burner, this time with TSM. The APAC team was starting to put up quite a fight in their next two matches, and it started with back-to-back game wins in games 2 and 3.

Rebellion teed off on TSM in the next game 8-1 to tie up the series, and scored at the buzzer to take the series and move to 2-0.

SR went untested in their final match against NIP, and secured the top spot of Group C with a 3-0 record.

TSM put up a fight against Twisted, but fell to the MENA #1 in 4 games.

Group D

Finally, in the group of death, Gentle Mates, FURIA, Spacestation, and R8 Esports did battle to see who would survive until Friday, and who would be heading home early. R8 put up a decent showing in M7Md’s first LAN match, but Spacestation dispatched of them in four games.

They then took care of business against FURIA in the same number of games. Gentle Mates easily swept FURIA and R8 to set up a clash between the undefeated to decide the winner of Group D.

Gentle Mates won the first two games in close fashion before convincingly dropping 4 goals on the SSG defense to finish the series. The Mates are now one of four undefeated teams in the tournament, alongside Rebellion, Man City and Karmine Corp.

R8 had FURIA on the ropes in the final series of the day before the Panthers flipped the script and completed the reverse sweep to stay alive. Each of the five games of that series were decided by one goal.

Friday Recap

Friday’s four face-offs decided the top 8 heading into Saturday. Spacestation was able to get past MIBR in the opening series to the dismay of the French faithful rooting on North America’s downfall.

Their energy would be rewarded in the next series, however, as FURIA finally returned to form against a crumbling NRG team.

NRG shutout FURIA in the opener but then lost in OT in game 2. FURIA took the next game as well and forced a Satthew timeout.

As per usual, the NRG trio took Sath’s words to heart and quickly dropped three goals on FURIA’s defence.

Not to be outdone, though, the Brazilians scored three unanswered to storm back and tie the game, and then netted the game-winner with 11 seconds to go.

NRG held FURIA scoreless all the way until 1:14 left on the clock and lost the game in regulation. They temporarily got out of dodge by sneaking away with a game 5 overtime win to extend the series, but collapsed on two brutal overcommits to lose the series. NA’s one seed was out.

Yanxnz, who typically pops off and yells across the stage during and after big wins, seemed more incredulous than amped up despite the massive upset. The longtime FURIA star stood up after the win and just threw his hands up in disbelief towards the NRG side, as if to say “what were you guys doing all series?”

FURIA had been trudging through LANs starting in Raleigh. Across the last four LAN tournaments, the Panthers had only won three series, finishing last in both EWC 2025 and the Boston Major. This is the team’s first top 8 appearance since Birmingham.

Twisted Minds and Team Vitality combined for a couple of quick wins to round out the day, sending FUT and NIP home, respectively.

Saturday Preview

Four more matches are on the docket for Saturday. We start off bright and early with a tangle between the undefeated Karmine Corp and the undefeated Gentle Mates, and then the 3-0 Shopify Rebels will be taking on Manchester’s finest shortly after.

FURIA and Twisted Minds clash in the lower bracket to decide who makes Championship Sunday, and Spacestation have another shot at finally being able to defeat Zen and Vitality, but they’ll have to do it on the road here in Paris.

At least one North American team is guaranteed to make Sunday, and a maximum of three from Europe can as well, four if the buzzsaw that is Team Vitality is able to win their match. The sixth and final Champ Sunday team will either be South American or Middle Eastern.

It’s been a heck of a ride so far, and with the crowd getting up and getting loud for gameday, we should be in store for two more days of electric, Paris Major action.