Acend are our Valorant Champions with 3-2 win over Gambit

After a year of online qualifiers, LAN Masters, and more, we finally have the champions of Valorant: Acend.

The EMEA team had a dominant run throughout the tournament, only losing one map before the grand finals.

Gambit, for their part, kept it close and even dominated Acend on Fracture. They’ll look to reload and come back next year to keep the same pace.

Jianhua Chen/Riot Games

Breeze: Gambit 13-11

Breeze was a story of defense, as Acend took an early lead while defending and Gambit battle back when the sides flipped.

Gambit have been the kings of comebacks this event, and they did it again on the first map of Grand Finals.

nAts had been relatively quiet in the last few matches, but he stood out in this one with a 29/10/6 show out on Viper.

Ascent: Acend 13-7

Ascent is one of Acend’s strongest maps, and they showed the reason why in the second round.

Although the 13-7 score seems close, Acend had the momentum for most of this one.

Almost all of the Acend boys had their moment to shine in this strong team win.

Fracture: Gambit 13-3

Fracture is the newest map in the lineup, so it makes sense that teams haven’t picked it a lot throughout the event.

In a five game series, though, most of the maps will be played. Gambit have a much better understanding of the newest map – at least by their recent performance.

Gambit easily take this one, with nAts and Chronicle leading the way on their top fragging supports.

PANDA POWER 🐼@nAts__ss is 13-0 on Fracture! #VALORANTChampions pic.twitter.com/heimXtg59J

— VALORANT Champions Tour (@ValorantEsports) December 12, 2021

Icebox: Acend 14-12

Icebox has been up and down for both teams, but Acend were generally favored to win this one.

It wasn’t an easy fight, though. In typical Gambit fashion, the squad went down early and battled back in the later rounds, looking like they were going to win in the second half.

Acend were able to keep their composure, however, and brought the momentum into overtime, where they secured the last two rounds, 2-0. 

Split: Acend 13-8

Acend put their final stamp on the series with a back-and-forth battle on Split, one of the classic competitive Valorant maps.

This was another team win for the boys, and although Gambit fought back, Acend were able to control the all-important pistol rounds on their way to a 13-8 victory.