KRÜ Blaze claw back from lower bracket to win Game Changers Championship

KRÜ Blaze have won the 2026 VALORANT Game Changers Championship, defeating Europe's Gentle Mates GC 3-2 in a five-map final at the Riot Games Arena in São Paulo on 1 November, according to Esports Insider.

No team from Latin America had previously taken the title, and no champion had ever come through the lower bracket to do it until KRÜ managed both at once.

The tournament ran from 22 October across ten teams. Gentle Mates collected US$100,000 for finishing second, Shopify Rebellion Gold took US$70,000 for third, and MIBR GC earned US$50,000 for fourth.

KRÜ's run to the title was far from straightforward. They opened with a 2-1 win over Gen.G GC in the upper-bracket quarter-finals on 23 October, but a 2-0 defeat to Shopify Rebellion Gold four days later sent them down into the lower bracket.

From there they swept both Team Liquid Brazil and MIBR GC without dropping a map, then beat Shopify Rebellion Gold a second time, 3-1, in the lower-bracket final on 31 October to set up the rematch with Gentle Mates.

The grand final itself swung repeatedly. Gentle Mates took the opening map, Haven, 13-5, before KRÜ levelled on Abyss by an identical scoreline. On the third map KRÜ built a 10-2 half-time lead only for Gentle Mates to claw back into contention, with KRÜ eventually closing it out 14-12 in overtime.

Gentle Mates responded by taking Split 13-8 to force a decider. KRÜ then controlled Ascent from the start, leading 11-5 at the break and finishing the map — and the series — by the same 13-8 margin Gentle Mates had used to extend the tie.

Liquipedia credited KRÜ's Argentine player tok1o with the tournament MVP award, while Brazilian duo antG and none became the first Brazilian players to win an international event staged in their own city of São Paulo, Esports Insider reported.

The win breaks a run of titles that had previously gone to Europe, through G2 Gozen in 2022, and North America, via back-to-back Shopify Rebellion wins in 2023 and 2024, before Team Liquid Brazil took it in 2025. KRÜ's own finishes had climbed steadily beforehand: seventh-to-eighth in 2022, fifth-to-sixth in both 2023 and 2024, and fourth last year.

For Gentle Mates, the defeat ends what had been an unbeaten run through the São Paulo bracket before the final, according to Esports News UK. It capped a season in which the EMEA side won Stage 1 by sweeping G2 Gozen 3-0 on 22 February, lost the Stage 2 final to SK Nebula on 24 May without taking a map, and lost the Stage 3 final to G2 Gozen on a fifth map on 30 August. The São Paulo silver leaves Gentle Mates with a single title from four finals this year.

KRÜ are also the last side to win the Game Changers Championship as a standalone event. From 2027 the final will instead be decided at Champions, and every team competing at next year's Game Changers Championship will receive a payment matching Gentle Mates' runners-up prize from this year. VALORANT Champions 2027 is scheduled to run from 16 September to 10 October in Austin.