Welcome, welcome, welcome. Week 1 of GOTN Season 2 is finally upon us. Over the past week, to the surprise of many, 6 additional teams came together, bringing the total team count to 18, two groups of 9. The match of the week will feature one of those new, but old teams, as the community is curious to see how this OG group of fraggers performs…

Awakening (0-0) vs GGG (0-0) – TIME TBD

GOTN TWITCH

Awakening come into Season 2 with something to prove. As we wrote in the preview, this is a team that has been on the tier-1 NA cusp for a long time. They’ve made several moves to try and take the next step up, the latest bringing in reflex for Tipzy. It’s been a rocky early going, as Awakening fell asleep in the GOTN Winter Classic, bowing out in the group stage. However, all of that will sure have been forgotten about as they step to the plate for GOTN Season 2. They will need to begin proving it immediately here in week 1 against GGG.

POTW: nilla

“no preparation, no thoughts regarding whatever version of ggg we are playing, but we expect a 3-0.” – nilla

Community favorites (for some) come into the season with an instant “welcome back to cod2” match. Okay, maybe the community isn’t exactly vanilla without them, but they definitely provide…something. The legendary troll squad that date as far back to the 5togo (amongst other squads) days are still here with us in 2026. And even though they may not take the game as seriously as some of us, this is still a much-improved roster from Dallas LAN, as well as GOTN Season 1. A team with debatably the most experience (trying hard or not) bring back method who was a bright spot for OG in Season 1. With other notables such as phil, saleen, axzn & strafizar – this is a team to watch. Admittedly, this match would have been better suited for them later on in the season after they had found their bearings, but nevertheless the schedule gods have given it to them now. I think they take one of the three maps.

POTW: strafizar, method

Writer Prediction: Awakening 2-1 GGG

GUEST PREDICTIONS

Loaded Pierogies (GGG A-team) vs Awakening

The return of GGG! (sort of!) The best players from the most infamous group that could probably field 3 or 4 teams this season, plus a secret pickup in Strafizar, everyone’s (2nd) favourite anti-lag aficionado, against an Awakening squad settling into a new roster dynamic, losing Tipzy and gaining reflex. Meaning we should see Verb as more of a dedicated shotty player. We’ll see if this new dynamic can function smoothly for Awakening vs a GGG squad of experienced gooners. The upset potential is possible for GGG, but I still expect Awakening to take this 2-1 – kevlar

2-1 awakening tj goes to ggg. Players to watch: Awakening – neoo. GGG – saleen – 1shot

Loaded Pierogis vs Awakening

Saleen gave me this quote to start this off: “my shit is thick but not long”. And this is going to be a slobber knocker to kick off week 1. Awakening made a change right after lan swapping out tipzy for reflex and want to move into that top tier. I’ll be honest since said lan not paid attention to how anyone is playing and I’m going to continue the rest of this prediction focusing solely on the polish dumpling team because hell yeah they’re back. Phil once said he’d rather run this genitals through a wood chipper before playing this game again but you can’t keep a gay man from the shaft long. Saleen is rocking a jocco setup from hotel rooms to play and axzn promised to knock his wife up while not using smoke exploits and only 1 of those will come true. The scourge(method) keeps bringing in his Colombian brethren on the roster to counter slushey playing CTF spots during search and destroy and it may end up working out cause straf is a fucking dork and knows all the stupid roof spots on each map. Zekski is there to jump in when slushy’s wife won’t let him play. GGG wins 13-11 all 3 maps. Make sure to watch phil in this video as a reminder why hes demarcko_flemming.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72F99102G6o – hero

Loaded Pierogies vs Awakening

One of the late additions to this season digs up community favorite GGG with a rebrand. This team died S1 due to some “For the greater good” smoke exploits but is back s2 with a bigger and better roster. They come up against an Awakening team that is going through its own rebuild after lan with the addition of Reflex, after moving on from long time player Tipzy. After his very impressive performance on LAN, Reflex was a hot commodity and was the first domino to roster mania post LAN. The big question is how he fits into this team and will it work? While Loaded Pierogies have been putting in some work the past week or so, I don’t think it will be enough to beat such an established team like Awakening. With Saleen playing on a glorified toaster this will be an uphill battle for the Pierogies.

Pred 3-0 Awakening

Players to watch: Meth and Reflex – Birdman

OTHER NOTABLE MATCHUPS

(because kevlar (legend) sent these to me unpromtped – thank you bud)

Group A MOTW:

Neph vs GOONS Revitalized rosters for both these teams, Neph with some big pickups in Timmer and Brutal, quite frankly they would be foolish to not field those 2 players in this match, but Neph have been a little unpredictable in the past, so we’ll see. GOONS with a shotty pickup in Redz, a fantastic pickup for them as well, sliding into that team perfectly. Should be a close one, but I’m expecting GOONS to get the W, 2-1 – kevlar

Group B MOTW:

We Love Cod4 vs Sedated (formerly Check6) The best cod4 team in NA, having won literally every cod4 cup in the past couple years, trying their hands at cod2. This team might not have as much cod2 specific game knowledge as Sedated, but that doesn’t mean WLCod4 should be taken lightly, specially after Sedated’s semi-recent roster shakeup, swapping out Lex for a more inexperienced Finessed. I still expect a win out of Sedated here, but the upset potential is absolutely present. Sedated 2-0