GIRG is in the same boat as the other seven finalists competing at WorldGaming’s Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare Canadian Championship on Sunday, they just happen to have a better crew than most.

The pickup roster of Canadian players is comprised of four mainstays on the professional Call of Duty scene, including a World League Open finalist and winner. 

One of the favourites to take home the national title at the Scotiabank Theatre in downtown Toronto features Renegades’ Andrew “IvYounGod” Ivers, Team Kaliber’s Jevon “Goonjar_JG” Gooljar-Lim, Team Allegiance’s Matteo “Royalty6” Faithfull and eUnited’s Pierce “Gunless” Hillman.

Hillman and eUnited won the CWL Atlanta Open in February and most recently finished second at the CWL Dallas Open on Mar. 19.

“I think the four of us are the four best players in Canada,” Ivers told TSN.ca. “If we were to lose to any of these guys I would be pretty disappointed, but if we were to lose to one of them it would probably be [SetToDestroyX]. We’re the two best teams in my opinion.”

On paper, he’s right.

STDx is another team that features a professional lineup. The roster of Michael “Beehzy” Said, Evan “HollerTV” Vart, John “Xotic16” Bruno and Mehran “OvOMayhem” Anjomshoa stands right alongside GIRG was one of the better choices to take home the $20,000 grand prize.

But a pickup tournament presents plenty of variables. These players are committed to different groups of four for most of the year and don’t have the time to fully prepare for an event of this nature. All four of GIRG’s members competed for their respective squads in Dallas less than a week ago.

With little time to prepare, Ivers says the team has no choice but to depend on their individual skill and hope to mesh quickly once the competition begins.

“The four of us, we’re just a team for this event,” he said, “so we haven’t practised at all together or anything because, although this is a big tournament for us and it’s a lot of money, as individual players our main focus is on playing with our actual teams for all the CWL stuff and competing throughout the year. So any practice we get is usually with our individual teams and then we come together for these tournaments and play how we all can individually.”

Having said that, another advantage GIRG brings to Toronto is a sense of familiarity with each other.

“We’ve all known each other for a while, aside from Gunless, who kind of came up in the scene recently, but I’ve played with Goonjar a lot. I’ve teamed with him for real before,” Ivers said. “Royalty, I haven’t played with him in anything serious before, but I’ve been friends with him for a while and competed with him in small stuff with him and against him throughout the last couple years. I’m pretty familiar with the guys and as along as we communicate well and play as we all can as individual players, we’ll be all good.”

In addition to the $20,000 grand prize, the winning team will also earn a spot at the CWL Anaheim Open. This incentive is useless to GIRG, as each player will likely be representing their own clubs in June, but that doesn’t take away any motivation to dominate on home soil.

“I really want to prove that the four of us are the best four Canadian players,” he said, “and I think this is a perfect opportunity to do that.”

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The teams competing for a piece of the $65,000 prize pool at WorldGaming’s Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare Canadian Championship are:

GIRG
SetToDestroyX
Fury Gaming
1Hype
Team Impulse
Earthroot Gaming
Rezist Esports
Solar HQ