Surprising underdogs shake up ESL Pro League S24: Aurora and 1win force the favourites to take them seriously

When the Swiss stage at ESL Pro League Season 24 in Katowice was over, it was not only the expected big names that had secured a spot in the playoffs. Aurora Gaming and 1win marched into the quarter-finals as two of the tournament's most surprising qualifiers – and their presence immediately changed the dynamics of the field.

1win impressed in the Swiss stage by defeating G2, Legacy and even Team Spirit, a result that sent shockwaves through the CS2 community. Aurora were no less remarkable: the team eliminated FURIA along the way and also had a second-place finish from StarSeries Season 20 to their name. Both teams reached the quarter-finals as 3-2 survivors from the Swiss round and faced each other in the day's first match.

It was Aurora who put a stop to 1win's run with a 2-0 victory – 13-9 on Dust II and 13-8 on Anubis. Aurora thus advance to the semi-final, where they face Vitality, the tournament's strongest Swiss-stage team with a 3-0 record.

The fact that two teams of this calibre reached the playoffs at all underlines how open the Swiss format can make a tournament. While MOUZ and Vitality entered the quarter-finals with momentum from perfect Swiss-stage records, the other favourites such as Spirit and Falcons had to grind through a far more uneven run – Spirit, for example, lost to 1win along the way.

Aurora's continued participation in the semi-final is the tournament's clearest proof that the Swiss stage does not merely sort out the weak, but actively produces surprises that can reshape the entire playoff hierarchy. With $1 million in prize money and a grand final on 11 October, the stakes are high – and Aurora have already proven that they are not here just to make up the numbers.