The Carolina Royal Ravens moved into playoff position with four match days remaining thanks to a sweep of GS Minnesota as Week 5 of qualifying for the Call of Duty League Stage 2 Major continued on Saturday.

Minnesota entered the day in fourth while Carolina was in seventh, but the resounding loss dropped Minnesota — which has lost two straight and three of its last four — into seventh place.

In other Friday action, Los Angeles Thieves remained in third place with a defeat of Cloud9 New York, Toronto KOI moved into fourth place with a 3-1 win over Vancouver Surge and Paris Gentle Mates boosted their bubble standing with a 3-1 victory against Boston Breach.

The 12 Call of Duty League teams are playing a full qualifying round robin to determine seeding for the second major of the season, to be held March 27-29 in Marston Green, England, as part of the DreamHack Birmingham event.

The top six teams in qualifying head straight into the Stage 2 Major playoffs, while the teams in seventh through 10th place will compete in a play-in round.

The Stage 2 Major champion will receive $150,000 and 100 Call of Duty League points, while the runner-up will get $90,000 and 75 CDL points.

Carolina pulled off the sweep of Minnesota with a 250-234 hardpoint win on Scar followed by a pair of wins on Exposure, 6-4 in Search and Destroy and 6-2 in Overload.

Toronto claimed the opener 250-196 in Colossus Hardpoint and bounced back from a 6-4 Exposure Search and Destroy Vancouver win by securing a 6-3 Exposure Overload win and closing with a 250-235 Scar Hardpoint success.

Los Angeles opened with a commanding 250-95 Colossus Hardpoint win, lost the second game 6-4 in Scar Search and Destroy but closed out the win to snap a three-match losing streak with a 5-3 Scar Overload victory followed by a 250-108 Scar Hardpoint rout.

In the final match of the day, Paris took a 2-0 lead with a 250-246 Colossus Hardpoint win and a 6-4 Scar Search and Destroy victory. Boston briefly extended the match with a 4-2 Den Overload win but Paris secured the match win with a 250-176 Den Hardpoint triumph.

The remaining Week 5 matches:

Sunday

–G2 Minnesota vs. Boston Breach

–Vancouver Surge vs. Miami Heretics

–Riyadh Falcons vs. Los Angeles Thieves

–FaZe Vegas vs. Carolina Royal Ravens

Call of Duty League Stage 2 Major qualifying standings (match record, map differential)

1. OpTic Texas, 9-0, +20

2. Miami Heretics, 5-3, +6

3. Los Angeles Thieves, 5-3, +8

4. Toronto KOI, 5-5, +2

5. Riyadh Falcons, 4-4, +2

6. Carolina Royal Ravens, 4-4, 0

7. G2 Minnesota, 4-4, -2

8. Paris Gentle Mates, 4-5, -2

9. FaZe Vegas, 3-5, -4

10. Vancouver Surge, 3-5, -7

11. Boston Breach, 3-6, -8

12. Cloud9 New York, 2-7, -15

–Field Level Media

Neither took the easy route, but Aurora Gaming and Natus Vincere are the last two teams standing at the ESL Pro League Season 23 Main Event at Stockholm.

Natus Vincere opened Saturday’s semifinals with a 2-1 win over FUT Esports, with Aurora following with its own 2-1 win, against Astralis.

The eight-team Counter-Strike: Global Offense event features a $275,000 prize pool. The single-elimination bracket consisted of best-of-three matches until Sunday’s grand final, which will be best-of-five. The championship side will receive $100,000.

Natus Vincere’s semifinal win was noteworthy in that the Ukrainian outfit was the last of the eight teams to advance to the main event out of online qualifying. After opening Saturday’s match with a 13-5 win on Mirage, Natus Vincere lost 13-11 on Ancient as FUT forced a winner-take-all third map. Natus Vincere took the map — 13-7 on Dust II — to advance and relegate FUT to Sunday’s third-place match.

Natus Vincere 67 kills and a plus-30 kill-death differential from Romanian Mihai “iM” Ivan. Drin “makazze” Shaqiri of Kosovo netted 51 kills. Romania’s Laurentiu “lauNX” Tarlea had 44 kills but a minus-4 differential as no FUT member had a positive differential.

Aurora, like Natus Vincere was one of the sixth- through eighth-place teams from the online tournament. Aurora had an even more difficult time in the semis, losing 13-11 on Nuke to open the match against Astralis. That forced Aurora in need of a reverse sweep in order to make the grand final … which they got, winning 13-2 on Dust II and 13-10 on Inferno.

Ali “Wicadia” Haydar Yalcin led the all-Turkish Aurora squad with 57 kills and a plus-21 K-D differential. Love “phzy” Smidebrant of Sweden led Astralis with 41 kills but had a minus-6 differential. Victor “Staehr” Staehr of Denmark had 39 kills and a plus-2 differential — the only Astralis player in the black — in the loss.

ESL Pro League Season 23 Main Event schedule

Sunday

–Astralis vs. FUT Esports (third-place match)

–Aurora Gaming vs. Natus Vincere (grand final)

ESL Pro League Season 23 prize pool

1. $100,000

2. $55,000

3. $37,500

4. $22,500

5-8. $15,000 — Team Spirit, Legacy, The MongolZ, MOUZ

–Field Level Media

NASHVILLE — No. 22 Vanderbilt will try to win its first Southeastern Conference tournament championship since 2012 when it meets 17th-ranked Arkansas on Sunday.

The Commodores (26-7), playing two miles from their campus, routed fourth-ranked Florida (the tournament’s top seed) by a 91-74 score on Saturday, snapping the Gators’ 12-game winning streak.

“Proud of the guys,” Vanderbilt coach Mark Byington said afterward. “Not really much celebrating. It’s on to Sunday, and that’s what we started this tournament for, is to play for a trophy on Sunday, and that’s what we have a chance to do tomorrow.”

Vanderbilt enters on a four-game winning streak, none of those wins coming on its campus.

Arkansas (25-8) has also won four straight, surviving in a 93-90 overtime win over Ole Miss to get here.

It’ll be the third game in three days for both teams, and Arkansas coach John Calipari was particularly perturbed about tournament scheduling on Friday evening.

After beating Oklahoma in a game that ended around 11:30 p.m. Central on Friday, Calipari lamented a Sunday tip-off that comes less than 19 hours after Arkansas finished off the Rebels.

Vanderbilt knows something about overcoming difficult circumstances lately.

The Commodores struggle against teams with size and rebounding, but in their last three games have knocked off the nation’s top offensive rebounding team in Tennessee (twice) and then clocked the Gators, who rank second.

Vanderbilt was beaten on the glass by Tennessee by counts of 40-31 and 46-34, and then 38-23 by Florida.

But neither team could come close to matching Vanderbilt’s guard play of Tyler Tanner (19.2 ppg, 5.2 apg, 2.4 spg) and Duke Miles (16.5 ppg, 4.2 apg, 2.6 spg).

The two have been a wrecking crew most of the season through their quickness and play-making ability. Tanner was a first-team All-SEC pick and Miles scored 30 in the win Friday over Tennessee.

Arkansas also has elite guards, led by SEC Player of the Year Darius Acuff Jr. (22.7 ppg, 6.5 apg) and Meleek Thomas (15.6 ppg). Acuff scored 24 and dished out seven assists on Saturday and Thomas added 29 and five.

Thomas played all 45 minutes on Saturday, just as he did in an 88-84 win over Missouri when Acuff was out with injury.

“There is no one that would say to Meleek anything that would believe him to believe he’s not as good as good as any player in the country,” Calipari said after Saturday. “He has otherworldly — otherworldly, now — confidence. Like, he could run for president one day. … I’ve gotta let him do some crazy stuff. I get on him but he’ll look at me like, ‘You’re nuts. You don’t have any idea how good I am.’ And I love that.”

The Razorbacks handed Vanderbilt its most lopsided loss of the season with a 93-68 walloping in Fayetteville on Jan. 20.

Arkansas is best in the country at avoiding turnovers (12.2%), per KenPom.

The 6-foot-3 Acuff and 6-5 Thomas also have the height advantage, respectively, on Tanner (6-0) and Miles (6-2), who had just 11 and five points, respectively, in the first game.

–Chris Lee, Field Level Media