OpTic Gaming win the first upper bracket semifinal of the MLG Americas Minor after defeating TSM 2-1 (16-7 on Overpass, 8-16 on Cache, and 16-11 on Mirage).

With the final match of the second day being an upper bracket semifinal to determine a team that would advance to the upper bracket final of the MLG Americas Minor, it was two majority Canadian teams that faced off across three maps: OpTic and TSM.

Solid CT holds from Keith "⁠NAF⁠" Markovic and Damian "⁠daps⁠" Steele on Overpass meant that OpTic finished the first half of the series with a bracing 10-5 score, and it was only a question of a few more T-side rounds that meant that the Green Wall team secured the first map with relative ease with a score of 16-7.

Kory "⁠SEMPHIS⁠" Friesen' post game interview after the Group A decider against NRG rang true on Cache, as TSM suddenly appeared like an entirely different team on the map and finished the first half with a 9-6 leading score (including SEMPHIS winning a one-versus-two on the last round of the half).

stanislaw led OpTic in the series

The T-side was even more Team SoloMid-sided as the Canadian-American team strung together seven rounds compared to OpTic's two (including Pujan "⁠FNS⁠" Mehta winning a one-versus-two postplant situation) to close out the second map with a 16-8 score.

Things therefore moved to the third map of Mirage which proved to be the most tightly contested map of the series. It was actually TSM who at first appeared poised to be the victor as FNS, Timothy "⁠autimatic⁠" Ta, and youngster Russel "⁠Twistzz⁠" Van Dulken all came up big on the team's CT-side to give them a 10-5 advantage.

However, OpTic were determined to take the "wall" sobriquet of their organisation to its fullest meaning and literally put up an unbreakable wall of defense on the second half (which saw an 11-1 score for OpTiC) to thus take Mirage 16-11 and advance to the upper bracket final.

MLG Regional Minor Championship AmericasBest of 3 OpTicMatchpage 2 1 21st May 2016 TSM 16Overpass 7 8Cache 16 16Mirage 11

OpTic	K - D	+/-	ADR	Rating 2.0
Peter 'stanislaw' Jarguzstanislaw	54 - 46	+8	87.7	1.21
William 'RUSH' WierzbaRUSH	56 - 52	+4	85.7	1.18
Keith 'NAF' MarkovicNAF	53 - 49	+4	77.8	1.13
Oscar 'mixwell' Cañellasmixwell	49 - 52	-3	68.4	1.02
Damian 'daps' Steeledaps	45 - 47	-2	60.1	0.92

TSM	K - D	+/-	ADR	Rating 2.0
Russel 'Twistzz' Van DulkenTwistzz	57 - 51	+6	85.3	1.16
Pujan 'FNS' MehtaFNS	48 - 47	+1	76.3	1.05
Hunter 'SicK' MimsSicK	43 - 53	-10	71.0	0.95
Timothy 'autimatic' Taautimatic	47 - 55	-8	69.6	0.92
Kory 'SEMPHIS' FriesenSEMPHIS	49 - 51	-2	68.3	0.91

The third day of action at the MLG Americas Regional Minor will first see the other upper bracket semifinal play out, between Tempo Storm and Selfless at 18:00 , and then continue with the upper bracket final (which will decide one team going to the Cologne qualifier in Katowice) and a lower bracket final.

stich writes for HLTV.org and can be found on Twitter