Ninjas in Pyjamas (NIP) have locked their spot in the StarLadder Budapest Major 2025 Stage 2 following a comfortable victory over Fluxo in Stage 1 on November 26th.
The victory against Fluxo (13-5 on Nuke and 13-5 on Train) sees NIP overcome a rocky start at the StarLadder Budapest Major Stage 1. They debuted with an embarrassing loss to NRG, who are playing with head coach Damian “daps” Steele instead of Nick “nitr0” Cannella, due to the latter going on paternity leave ahead of the Major.
But, since the loss to NRG, NIP won three games in a row, beating Lynn Vision, FaZe Clan, and Fluxo to advance to Stage 2 of the StarLadder Budapest Major.
Although NIP aren’t one of the favorites to win the StarLadder Budapest Major, they traveled to Hungary full of expectations, as this is the organization’s first major since BLAST.tv Paris Major 2023.
They missed both of the Majors in 2024 (PGL Copenhagen and Perfect World Shanghai) and couldn’t garner enough Valve Regional Standings (VRS) points to qualify for BLAST.tv Austin earlier this year.
Marco “Snappi” Pfeiffer, the in-game leader and most experienced player on NIP, talked to stage host James Banks after making Stage 2. This is his first CS2 Major ever.
It’s been a tough year overall, but I think we’ve done a good job climbing [the ranks], there’s been a lot of challenges. We’ve want to go through most Stages.
Over the past couple of months, NIP have been hanging around the tier 1.5, as they’ve done enough to play better than most tier-two teams, but still have to break into tier-one.
The StarLadder Budapest Major presents a huge opportunity for NIP, because if they do well enough in Stage 2, they’ll gain precious VRS points for the 2026 season. There are some good teams in Stage 2, like Aurora, Team Liquid, Natus Vincere, Astralis, and 3DMAX, which are all above NIP in the Valve ranking.
The third day of the StarLadder Budapest Major will carry on with three 1-2 matches, featuring fan favorites FaZe Clan and GamerLegion fighting for survival in Stage 1.
Feature image credit: © StarLadder
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