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9z vs Aurora Gaming: AI prediction, Thunderpick World Championship
9z and Aurora Gaming meet on 14 October — group stage, Thunderpick World Championship 2026, best of three. The AI models' bet: Under 2.5 maps at 1.67 — 10 of 14 models chose it. Below: the analysis, the odds, team form by series, rosters with player ratings and the map pool.
- Thunderpick World Championship 2026
- Group stage
- Best of three
- Stream
published · updated UTC
AI models' pick: Under 2.5 maps
1.67AI models' pick · 10 of 14 for this bet, 4 for others
Match odds
Since the first snapshot 9z have drifted: 3.57 → 3.70, Aurora Gaming — 1.35 → 1.35. The money is going on Aurora Gaming.
abbreviations
- 1, 2 — 9z or Aurora Gaming wins the series
- H1, H2 — map handicap: −1.5 means winning the series without dropping a map, +1.5 means taking at least one map
- O, U — total maps over or under: over 2.5 means the series goes to a third map
AI prediction and analysis
The largest group of AI models went for under 2.5 maps. 3 more went for an Aurora Gaming win. One more went for over 2.5 maps.
Aurora Gaming come into the Thunderpick World Championship with seven wins from their last ten series, and that run was built against serious opposition: 2-0 over Spirit, ranked first, plus 2-1 wins against FURIA in seventh and BetBoom in eleventh. 9z, by contrast, have three wins and seven defeats to show from the same stretch, including a 0-2 loss to Natus Vincere, 34th in the ranking, and a 0-2 defeat by Aurora Gaming themselves on 3 October, a series in which Dust2 ended 13-3 for Aurora.
The 90-day map numbers point to teams of very different calibre: a 10-18 record and a round difference of -55 for 9z, against 37-22 and +93 for Aurora Gaming. Both head-to-heads over the past two years finished 2-0. 9z's best-of-threes have reached a third map just 3 of 12 times, and that is the backbone of our pick, under 2.5 maps at 1.67. The counterweight is Aurora Gaming's own habit of going long: a decider in 10 of their 22 series.
Where we could be wrong
The veto is not known yet. Anubis is almost always 9z's first ban, taking away Aurora Gaming's most frequent pick, while 9z pull the series towards Dust2, where their opponents sit on an even 4-4. And Aurora Gaming have played seven maps in a week to just two for 9z — a schedule like that in the group stage is the sort of thing that can cost them a map.
Form, rosters and maps
9z
17th in the Valve ranking · 1543 points
roster · player rating over six months
- meyern5.73
- max5.86
- luchov6.24
- dgt6.40
- HUASOPEEK6.07
recent series · 3 wins, 7 losses
- L0-2FURIA#7ESL Pro League Season 2407.10
- W2-0BetBoom#11ESL Pro League Season 2406.10
- L0-2Natus Vincere#34ESL Pro League Season 2405.10
- W2-0TYLOO#44ESL Pro League Season 2404.10
- L0-2Aurora#9ESL Pro League Season 2403.10
- L1-2G2#5FISSURE Playground 310.09
- L0-2MIBR#12FISSURE Playground 309.09
- W2-05star#80FISSURE Playground 308.09
- L0-2Vitality#3BLAST Open Fall 202629.08
- L0-2MOUZ#4BLAST Open Fall 202627.08
maps over 90 days
10–18, round difference −55; 3 of 12 best-of-three series went to a third map
Rounds won on the CT side 49%, on the T side 42%, pistol rounds 50%
6 days since the last series, 2 maps this week
map pool over 90 days
| Map | W–L | Rounds ± | Picks | Bans |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nuke | 2–6 | −27 | 2 | 1 |
| Dust2 | 3–3 | −18 | 4 | |
| Mirage | 3–2 | +9 | 4 | |
| Cache | 2–2 | +4 | 1 | |
| Inferno | 0–3 | −16 | 3 | |
| Ancient | 0–2 | −7 | 2 | |
| Anubis | — | 7 |
Bans Anubis first in 7 of 8 series
Aurora Gaming
9th in the Valve ranking · 1716 points
roster · player rating over six months
- XANTARES6.21
- woxic6.21
- Jimpphat6.26
- kyxsan5.70
- Wicadia6.42
recent series · 7 wins, 3 losses
- W2-0Spirit#1ESL Pro League Season 2411.10
- L1-2Vitality#3ESL Pro League Season 2410.10
- W2-01win#38ESL Pro League Season 2409.10
- W2-1FURIA#7ESL Pro League Season 2406.10
- W2-1BetBoom#11ESL Pro League Season 2405.10
- L0-2Falcons#6ESL Pro League Season 2404.10
- W2-09z#17ESL Pro League Season 2403.10
- L1-3Vitality#3StarLadder StarSeries Fall 202620.09
- W2-1Vitality#3StarLadder StarSeries Fall 202619.09
- W2-0NRG#47StarLadder StarSeries Fall 202618.09
maps over 90 days
37–22, round difference +93; 10 of 22 best-of-three series went to a third map
Rounds won on the CT side 61%, on the T side 46%, pistol rounds 56%
2 days since the last series, 7 maps this week
map pool over 90 days
| Map | W–L | Rounds ± | Picks | Bans |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mirage | 10–6 | +8 | 3 | 1 |
| Anubis | 9–3 | +41 | 8 | |
| Dust2 | 4–4 | +9 | 3 | 6 |
| Nuke | 7–1 | +37 | 2 | |
| Cache | 3–4 | −4 | 7 | |
| Inferno | 4–3 | +4 | 6 | |
| Ancient | 0–1 | −2 | 1 | 14 |
Bans Ancient first in 14 of 17 series
head-to-head series, last two years
2 series: 9z 0 wins, Aurora Gaming 2 wins
- L0-2Dust2 3-13, Mirage 11-13ESL Pro League Season 2403.10
- L0-2Nuke 1-13, Dust2 5-13Intel Extreme Masters Cologne Major 202614.06
Valve ranking as of 5 October
