It’s down to eight at Intel Extreme Masters San Jose: Among them the second best foreigner of all time, the leader of the current World Ranking, the only player who won IEM twice and many more – here are nine facts you should know about these eight players.

[revival] now is the player with the third most Intel Extreme Masters played

[revival] is just playing his eighth Intel Extreme Masters. That puts him on the same level as [hasuobs]. Just two players competed more often in IEM-tournaments: [mc] (10 times) and [grubby] (9). [revival] has won once so far (IEM Shanghai, July 2013) and was fifth twice (IEM Guangzhou, November 2011 and IEM Singapore, November 2012).

[hero] is the only player who was won twice at IEM

In 22 Intel Extreme Masters in Starcraft 2 so far only one player has won twice: [hero]. And he didn’t just win twice he won back-toback at IEM Singapore in December 2013 and IEM Sao Paulo in February 2014. The only player still in the competition at San Jose who could close the gap on him is [revival].

[snute] has just surpassed [naniwa] as the second best foreigner of all time

We all knew that [snute] had an successful year so far, but can you imagine just how good he is? He surpassed [naniwa] as the second best foreigner of all time counting the World Ranking points he amounted in his career. [snute] now has 22,266, 100 more than his swedish opponent. The best foreigner still is [stephano] who gathered 37,379 points. Out of all Starcraft players the French is 10th while [snute] is 22nd now.

[snute] has always reached the playoffs in IEM this year – but never farther

Third Intel Extreme Masters for [snute] in 2014, third time he is in the playoffs. But depsite all the success the Norwegian had this year, he never made it farther. At IEM Shenzhen in July he was ahead by 2:1 against [jaedong] but lost 2:3. Even worse, at IEM Toronto Round of 8 in August he lead by 2:0 against [flash] – and lost. So after trying to beat a Zerg, then a Terran, now he has to play a Protoss. May it work this time!

IEM San Jose is just the third time in two years that [rain (by.sun)] travels abroad for a tournament

Some people just like to stay at home. [rain (by.sun)] is one of them. He has traveled abroad for just three tournaments in the past two years. But when he did, he did good like at the WCS Season 2 Finals in August 2013 in Cologne which he finished as fifth. Or at IEM Cologne in February of this year when he was third. Or today, when…

[forgg] is on the peak of his career

This sounds surprising considering how long [forgg] has been around, but his triumph at Dreamhack Winter last week was his first success at a mjor tournament. So knowing that it is completely unsurprising that he is on the peak of his career right now which means rank 22 in the current World Ranking, just one place behind todays opponent [rain (by.sun)].

[gumiho] is one the biggest underdogs in IEM-playoff-history

[gumiho] is on rank 257 of the current World Ranking which is by far the worst position of all remaining players in San Jose. In the history of Intel Extreme Masters there have only been three players who were bigger underdogs: [abomb] who was 773th at the time of IEM Sao Paulo in February, [gatored] who was 441th at the time of at IEM New York in October 2011 and [feast] who was 399th at the time of IEM Sao Paulo in February 2012.

It’s not the first important quarter-finals in which [jaedong] and [gumiho] meet

With 58 tournaments in [jaedong]s career and 49 in [gumiho]s it’s no wonder both have met before: In the 2013 Dreamhack Stockholm [gumiho] was at the top of his play. He had dominated the second group stages and only lost to [leenock] who went on to win the tournament later. [jaedong] was struggling in the second group stage, losing to [sase] but both made it to the round of 8 where they had to battle each other. It was a rather short fight. [jaedong], just #106 of the World Ranking back then, beat the #49 [gumiho] by 2:0 – and lost in the next round to [naniwa].

[bomber] leads the World Ranking – but he was never in an IEM-semifinal

[bomber] may lead the World Ranking. He may be sponsored by Red Bull, the lovers of extreme sports. But in the Intel Extreme Masters he has never made it to a semifinal. He lost to [violet] at IEM Cologne in 2012 in the round of 8, to [hero] in the group stage of IEM Singapore and to [tlo] in the quarter-finals of IEM Sao Paulo this February.