Mousesports initially entered Counter-Strike in 2002 with CS 1.6 and has fielded teams in edition of CS since, including two separate teams during the Counter-Strike: Source era.
Mousesports’ CSGO team has gone through multiple iterations, two of which are most notable. Its roster helmed by Nikola "NiKo" Kovač was its most explosive, with NiKo, Chris "chrisJ" de Jong, and Tomáš "oskar" Šťastný comprising the team’s core.
Initially, mouz struggled in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, with its roster seemingly unable to adjust to the mechanical changes that accompanied CSGO's release. While it was talented enough to make it past regional qualifiers and into main events, their tournament performance was rarely impactful early on.
In 2015, a roster consisting of well-known names like Nikola "LEGIJA" Ninić and Fatih "gob b" Dayik still participated in a Weekly FACEIT League. An occasional tournament win in '15 was offset by mouz's poor performances at both Majors that year: ESL One Cologne and Cluj-Napoca.
Fans saw more of the same in 2016 as mouz took home wins at regional qualifiers but failed to show up at the sport's top-tier tournaments. The roster was unable to finish higher than ninth place in either ESL One Cologne or MLG Columbus, putting the roster in replacement territory for the organization.
To that effect, the organization hired Aleksandar "kassad" Trifunović to coach the team in June while replacing Johannes "nex" Maget with Tomáš "oskar" Šťastný. In a case study in "one step forward, two steps back," Kassad left the team only two months later. oskar sent himself to the bench for unspecified personal reasons soon after. Mousesports’ sole highlight in 2016 was a third-place finish at ECS Season 4.
2017 was a whirlwind year for mouseports. The organization benched Chrisj in favor of oskar at the same time as FaZe Clan was in the process of acquiring NiKo. FaZe's successful buyout of NiKo forced Chrisj back to the active roster after just 10 days on the bench. In April, mouz signed the young Robin “ropz” Kool in what would become a move that would pay dividends for the organization in the coming years. To make room, mousesports benched Timo “Spiidi” Richter soon after mouz failed to qualify for DreamHack Open Austin.
Ropz’s presence began to slowly transform mouz. Adding suNny and STYKO accelerated that growth, but the real impetus for mousesports’ movement into the top five was the acquisition of Finn "karrigan" Andersen in early 2019.
Karrigan’s captaincy was a catalyst for the team breaking into the top five towards the end of the year. Surrounded by young, moldable players, his energy and enthusiasm led mouz to an incredible second half of 2019 that saw the team bring home trophies from the CSGO Asia Championships, ESL Pro League Season 10 Finals, and the ICE Challenge 2020.
