Valorant NSG - Winter Championship: Schedule, format, teams, prize pool and how to watch

While many fans of Valorant esports will be casting their minds to slightly later in the year when the Valorant Championship Tour will kick off around the world, there are still a few tournaments to enjoy before we get to the main event, providing viewers with an opportunity to see some of their favourite players and teams face off against each other.

Are you ready for some frosty frags? 🥶

Our $25,000 @PlayVALORANT Winter Championship kicks off tomorrow at 12 PST featuring some of the top talent in the VALORANT scene!

Check out the thread below to meet the teams 👇 pic.twitter.com/o8N5n2tDIT

— Nerd Street Gamers (@nerdstgamers) January 12, 2021

One such tournament is Nerd Street Gamers Winter Championship which kicks off today (13th January) and runs throughout the week.

Featuring some of the best of North America including Sentinels, Team Envy, and Cloud9 Blue who will be scrambling to look for a replacement for their star man Tyson "TenZ" Ngo who announced he was stepping back from competitive action as he looks to build on his career as a content creator.

There is a huge TenZ shaped hole in Cloud9 Blue's roster. (Picture: ESL)

There aren't too many more opportunities to see North American's best duking it out (if any, no other tournaments are scheduled) so if you intend on tuning here is everything you need to know about the event.

Teams

There are sixteen teams in all with four invited.

The four invited are:

• Sentinals
• Team Envy
• Cloud9 Blue
• Dignitas

Sentinels will enter the tournament as favourites. (Picture: Sentinels)

The qualified teams are those that were successful in Nerd Street Gamers' September, October and November tournaments, they are:

• Equinox Esports
• Luminosity Gaming
• Team 2D
• XSET
• Moon Raccoons
• Project !
• Andbox
• eUnited
• Sedated
• NRG
• Built By Gamers
• Spacestation Gaming

Schedule

• January 13 - 15: Group Stages starts at 12 pm PST / 15 pm EST / 8 pm GMT each day.
• January 16 - 17: Quarter-finals and semi-finals starts 12 pm PST / 15 pm EST / 8 pm GMT.
• January 17: Grand Final starts at 2 pm PST / 17 pm EST / 10 pm GMT.

Format

• Group Stage: 4 groups of four teams in a GSL format.
  • Top two teams advance to the Playoffs
  • All matches are Bo3
• Playoffs: 8 teams Single Elimination bracket
  • All matches (excl. Grand Final) are Bo3
  • Grand Final is Bo5

Prize distribution / final placement

There is a $25,000 prize pool on the line with the top three teams walking away with their share of the cash.

Place	$ USD	Team
1st	$15,000	TBD
2nd	$7,500	TBD
3rd	$2,500	TBD

We will update this page with the final placements when the tournament finishes.

Nerd Street Gamers: Winter Championship - how to watch

You will be able to catch all the action on Nerd Street Gamers' Twitch channel which we have embedded below.

nerdstgamers - TwitchBringing Esports to Everyone.Twitch