Faze road will be hard on IEM Oakland 2017 group stage
The organizers of the IEM Oakland 2017 tournament revealed today the first information about the group stage and the distribution of all the participating teams.
ESL has revealed the groups for the upcoming Intel Extreme Masters (IEM) stop in Oakland.
The North American event will run from November 16-19 at the Oracle Arena, with 12 teams duking it out for $300,000 in prize money.
The tournament will begin with two groups of six teams, who will face each other in a best-of-one round robin stage. The group winners will progress to the semi-finals, while the second and third-placed sides will advance to the first round of the playoffs, which will decide the final two teams making it to the last-four stage.
Both the semi-finals and the final will be played in front of a crowd at the Oracle Arena, with the title decider featuring a best-of-five format.
IEM Oakland will feature the new overtime system recently introduced in the ESL Pro League, which means that, if a match ends in overtime, winners will take two points, instead of three, and losers will take a point, instead of zero.
Below you can find the group draw in full:
| Group A | Group B |
| SK | FaZe |
| Cloud9 | G2 |
| NiP | Gambit |
| Astralis | Liquid |
| TheMongolz | Immortals |
| EnVyUs | OpTic |
