Which heroes brought Team Yandex the victory at BLAST Slam VIII
Following their triumph at PGL Wallachia Season 9, Team Yandex went on to win BLAST Slam VIII as well, defeating the reigning The International champions — Team Spirit — in the grand final. In this article, we’ll analyze the drafts of what is currently the strongest team of the new season.
At BLAST, the team played 7 series with a win rate of 73.68%, losing only one match and 5 maps out of 19. Most often, Yandex picked Windranger (8 games with a win rate of 87.50%), Nature’s Prophet (6 games with a 66.67% win rate), Rubick (5 games with a 60.00% win rate), and Techies (5 games with a 100.00% win rate). Additionally, the Windranger-Techies and Windranger-Earth Spirit pairings had a 100% win rate across 3 and 4 maps, respectively.
Yandex faced off against Team Spirit most often in the tournament, and it was precisely their drafts against the “Dragons” that stood out for their originality. In matches against Spirit, each TY player picked a hero they had never picked in competition against other teams: Watson on Anti-Mage, CHIRA_JUNIOR on Viper, ATF on Monkey King, Saksa on Undying, and Malady on Clockwerk. Team Spirit was truly unprepared for this “steal” of their comfortable heroes: all these unique picks secured Team Yandex’s victory over the “Dragons”, including on the decisive map of the grand final, which Watson on AM finished with a 19/5/14 KDA.
Team Yandex’s drafts against MOUZ, BetBoom Team, and LGD Gaming, as well as PARIVISION, whom they faced once each during the championship, were quite similar and standard for the current meta. They often included Hoodwink, Techies, Pangolier, Nature’s Prophet, Winter Wyvern, Earth Spirit, and Rubick — heroes that other teams were also actively using.
Against Team Yandex, most often were banned heroes that were comfortable picks for ATF, but this tactic was not successful. Even without Huskar and Timbersaw, Ammar found suitable replacements that led to victory, such as Necrophos and Dawnbreaker. Bans on meta heroes or direct counterpicks, however, proved to be the most effective. The best ban against TY was Enigma (11 bans with an 81.8% win rate), while Huskar turned out to be the statistically worst ban (13 bans with a 21.4% win rate). The most successful pick against Yandex was Slark (100% win rate over 2 maps), while the worst choice was Terrorblade, who did not win a single map out of 4.
BLAST Slam VIII took place from 29.09.2026 to 11.10.2026. Sixteen teams participated in the tournament, competing for a prize pool of $750,000.
As CyberScore previously reported, Satanic was once again one of the best carries at BLAST Slam VIII.
by CyberScore