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The 2023 Halo World Championship final has seen FaZe Clan record one of the most dominant bracket reset victories in Halo grand finals history, with the reigning world champions OpTic Gaming crumbling under pressure in the two best-of-seven series.
Both FaZe and OpTic dominated their respective groups and were set for a collision course early in the playoffs, as they met in the upper-bracket semi-final after winning their respective quarter-finals in 3-0 fashion.
The first meeting between OpTic and FaZe ended in a 3-2 victory for OpTic Gaming and sent FaZe Clan into the lower-bracket quarter-finals.
After being sent to the lower-bracket FaZe began their mission to make it into the grand final, defeating Native Gaming Red, Sentinels and Spacestation Gaming without dropping a single match and set up a mouthwatering rematch with OpTic in the grand final.
Due to OpTic running through the upper-bracket, FaZe had to beat the reigning world champions twice to claim the World Championship title, in what is known as a “bracket reset”.
Going into the final, OpTic was expected to win and went into the series as favourites, based off their win over FaZe earlier in the tournament, and after they claimed the first two games of the best-of-seven series, it appeared as though they would go on and win it all.
However, FaZe went onto dominate the next four games and claim the first series, which reset the bracket and took the grand final to second best-of-seven clash.
When the teams returned to the stage, FaZe appeared to determined to take down the reigning champions and after a 250-22 Strongholds trashing, OpTic Gaming’s heads began to drop.
OpTic showed some fight in the second game, as they went down narrowly in the Slayer game mode (49-50), but FaZe would continue to roll on and take the second best-of-seven series 4-0.
New kings on the mountain top. 👑
Congratulations to your 2023 @Halo World Champions – @FaZeClan!
💍 @FrostyBB
💍 @SnakeBiteFPS
💍 @Renegade_JW
💍 @Royal2
💍 @Chris_Royal1 #HaloWC | #FaZeUp pic.twitter.com/4cadzH9m66— Halo Esports #HaloWC (@HCS) October 16, 2023
Jonathan “Renegade” Willette, Bradley “Frosty” Bergstrom, Mathew “Royal2” Fiorante and Paul “SnakeBite” Duarte earned their first World Championship title together, and took home the US$400,000 winners cheque.
