LOS ANGELES -- A little more than a year ago at Agganis Arena in Boston, history was made in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive.
Cloud9, an all-North American squad, beat the odds by making a Cinderella run to the final of the ELEAGUE Major, the equivalent of a world championship. After making it through the top French team in G2 Esports and then Brazil's best in SK Gaming, its reward was a date with a bona fide European super team in FaZe Clan, a squad that possessed an array of the world's best talent with ace player Nikola "NiKo" Kovač at the helm.
The final between FaZe and C9 was a war of attrition like no other in esports, with the Americans prevailing in the deciding set after three overtimes to become the first North American organization to ever win a CS:GO major. In the middle of the celebration stood Jake "Stewie2K" Yip, clutching the pinnacle achievement of a game he began playing only three years prior.
After years of talk anointing him the possible savior of a fractured North American scene, he accomplished what once seemed impossible.
"Over time, you just learn to worry about yourself," Stewie2K said at the iBUYPOWER Masters IV tournament in January. "It's not about the other people. It's not about the fans and what they say about you, how they set expectations so high. Even if they set them so high, they need to realize it's going to take some time to get there. For me, I have to be realistic with myself."
And almost one year from when he won the major and his whirlwind of experiences began, Stewie2K will be on a plane once more flying toward another world championship. This time, however, he will not be playing in the friendly confines of a North American city. This major is at the yearly IEM Katowice event in Poland, which has been home to some of the greatest moments to ever take place in Counter-Strike.
This time, though, the North American star will try to make CS:GO history in a Team Liquid jersey.
The story didn't end after that crowning achievement in Boston. Stewie2K had won the most important tournament of his life and was coming up on his third year on Cloud9. Instead of falling into complacency and living off the miracle championship run for the rest of his career, Stewie made the decision that he thought would give him the best chance at reaching the summit once more. He asked for a transfer to a new team, and Cloud9 CEO Jack Etienne obliged, letting his prodigal talent walk his own path to the sunny pastures of Brazil.
Following the team's loss to C9 at the Boston major, SK Gaming, the Brazilian core spearheaded by captain Gabriel "FalleN" Toledo and two-time HLTV Player of the Year Marcelo "coldzera" David, moved over to an Immortals team that was being rebranded as Made in Brazil, a legendary entity that has roots dating to the early days of Counter-Strike in the early 2000s. Stewie2K believed his best chance to win was to team up with the Brazilian giants and C9 teammate Tarik "tarik" Celik on the revamped SK roster that three months later would become MIBR.
In theory, the idea was sound. Coldzera is one the most gifted players in the history of CS:GO, and FalleN, at his side, is one of the most accomplished leaders. Add Stewie and tarik, two recent major winners, mix together a bit of chemistry and a dash of luck here and there, and boom, you have yourselves a legitimate title contender for years to come. Stewie2K didn't just want to win a single major where every star aligned along the way to reach the championship; he wanted a team that was feared each time it took its place on stage. With MIBR, he truly believed that would be the case.
Unfortunately, in sports, transitioning from paper to results is never quite so simple. Months later, he was wearing a Team Liquid jersey in Hollywood at the iBUYPOWER event and reflecting on his time in South America.
"It was difficult, but I definitely learned a lot," Stewie2K said. "It was a good learning experience for me throughout the year. It's not easy, going into a team with so much hype and so many fans around them. They have high expectations, and eventually, those expectations get into your head as well.
"Like, you don't know how much time it'll take to reach those expectations. I kept myself level-headed with those expectations. I felt like we were getting there, but it took a lot more time than expected since we couldn't speak the same language very well."
Outside of a Zotac Cup Masters tournament victory, there were no confetti showers for Stewie2K like his magical moment in Boston on C9. In the one major Stewie 2Kplayed on MIBR, the team stumbled to a 3-2 qualification in the group stage and managed to reach the semifinals before bowing out in unceremonious fashion against Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev's Natus Vincere.
Even in that tournament, MIBR got the best draw possible. The team avoided the dynastic Astralis and surging Team Liquid, squads that surely would have put the Brazilian team at elimination's doorstep in the quarterfinals.
To many, a semifinal finish at a world championship would have been considered a massive victory, especially for an American. For Stewie2K, though, it wasn't enough. He left C9 to win. Due to language barrier issues and a lack of time to find the chemistry needed to become a team capable of challenging Astralis, a champion a level above even the other top teams in the world, MIBR was in a repeating cycle that would only end in moral victories and top-four finishes without lifting the grand prize.
"I learned a lot from [MIBR]," he said. "I learned how to play their style and learned their perspective of the game. It opened up my mind a lot more and made me more versatile."
At the end of December, right before Christmas, MIBR and North America's best team, No. 2 in the world behind Astralis, made a trade. MIBR received Epitácio "TACO" de Melo and head coach Wilton "zews" Prado to create an all-Brazilian roster, and Stewie2K went over to Team Liquid, where he would feel he had the best of both worlds: a team strong enough to compete for a championship every time they played and one where a language barrier wouldn't be an issue.
Champions of iBuyPower after the scrappy 2-1 against @astralisgg ! Thanks for all the support and love for my debut in @TeamLiquid 🏆💙 pic.twitter.com/HVcGK8iMLo
— Jake (@Stewie) January 21, 2019
Team Liquid in the second-half of 2018 affirmed itself as the second-best team in the world. But, in a world with Astralis, No. 2 could feel as fulfilling as a team narrowly making it out of group stages. The move to pick up Stewie2K was an effort to give the team the extra spark, the additional firepower, to topple what could be the greatest team in CS:GO history.
Those efforts proved fruitful. Liquid managed to take down Astralis 2-1 at the iBUYPOWER event in January, and the team will hope to do more of the same in the coming week in Poland.
There, surrounded by thousands in attendance and with a slew of rival teams vying for the same goal, Team Liquid will try to carve out its own legacy.
"This is probably the most skilled team I've been on," Stewie2K said of his roster a day before it took down Astralis in January. "With the Brazilians, I didn't feel like they were at their peak performance. There were flashes here and there, but right now during practice and stuff, you can really see the mechanical aim these guys have and the skill they have and the way of their thinking. It's nice to see another perspective, and hopefully, I can add my perspective as well and make them better."
Astralis is still heading into Katowice as the heavy favorite to lift a second straight major title, but Team Liquid sent a message at iBUYPOWER that the team hopes will resonate overseas. It's a sign that for all of Astralis' accomplishments, that team is not unbeatable.
"I'm hoping to finally to show my potential and reach my ceiling," Stewie2K said. "At the end of the day, it's all about winning. I want titles. I don't care about stats. I don't care about ending up on Top 20 HLTV. As long as I get where I want to be, then I'm happy with it."