Excello has been this year's break out team so far, fighting with EG for first place in ESEA-Invite and making a lot of noise in the scene. In this interview Cj 'cJ_B' Banarsee talks about his team's growth into one which can challenge the likes of EG and coL as well as their plans on becoming one who can compete with the European sides.

You are a pretty unfamiliar name in the international scene, for our non-American viewers, can you give us the history of cJ_B and how it is you came to be one of the top players in the United States?

I'm 19 in June, I currently go to college and work part time. Well I started playing Counter-Strike competitively in 2003. I live in NYC so the LAN scene was really at its best around this time. Especially with tournaments every other weekend at one of USA's best lan centers: web2zone. I always wanted to compete with the best but this game requires experience and experience takes time. Unlike a lot of players I competed in almost every league division from the bottom to the top. So I really worked my way up, experiencing some of the worse losses ever!

Describe a brief history of Excello and how it is that you managed to bring them from a mediocre team to beating EG 16-2 like clockwork, and describe to us the current roster of the the team and what they each bring to the table.

Excello took plenty of beatings before we could even have the knowledge to compete with these teams. Although the 16-2 vs. EG looks brutal, they were indeed missing possibly their best player n0thing. We're at a point were we are aiming for the top and anything stopping us will have to move. Every loss I take, I learn from it so that plays a big role in us being able to compete a lot better this season then the last couple of seasons. Our current roster is cJ_B, hazard, jstone, pauly and Lim. We've managed to hold on to our core of the roster which includes hazard jstone and I.

My role is as most can guess, to call the tactics for our team. I'm also really good at reading the opposing team and making the right plays to put rounds in our favor. Hazard can be considering one the best AWPers in the U.S. at this moment, he AWPs for us and has a really good sense of midgame. Although people say Jstone is something like n0thing, I think n0thing was something like Jstone. Jstone played for f2 in the 3D/coL days and has always been a crazy aimer. He has to be top 5 when it comes to the rifles. Lim is the oldest and most experienced. He brings experience to the table coming from notable teams like MoB and eMg. Pauly is fairly new to the invite scene, he's the youngest of us all and still is evolving into himself as a player. He has a deadly AK and is always there to encourage us and not let us get down. Also a very good team player, able to secure rounds for us.

Last season your team, Excello, did fairly decent but nothing compared to this year where you're fighting with EG for first place in ESEA-Invite, what changes did you make to both yourself and the team that contributed to your success?

I don't want to call it success until we see how we do at this upcoming ESEA finals. There's a lot of things the public don't see in teams which really isn't their fault. Last season we had to throw a last minute pug together, keeping the core of the team of course. Alex, Jason and myself, taking projeckt and demos attended with us. With no practice, we came in hoping we'd just outskill the other prepared teams. That failed miserably, but was a good experience for us. Also when you lose to the same teams season after season, you start to understand why you're losing and the gap between the teams becomes smaller. That played a big role for us, as well as bringing fresh players into the lineup to renew the hunger in us. Some of the players we played with were always negative and only made us worse.

Since Excello has already clinched a spot at this season's LAN Finals in Dallas next month, what are you guys doing to prepare for the event beforehand, and what do you do yourself to prepare for such a large and important event?

We have been playing our normal routine and are still competing in CEVO and ESEA so as the time gets closer were gonna grind harder. This season were going in with the same five we've been competing with all season. We play about 3-4 hours a night and we're watching our competition closely.

As we know, online play is completely different from LAN play, having not played on LAN yet with your new roster do you think that will affect you negatively in the LAN Finals or do you feel you guys have enough chemistry to pull it off?

I feel very confident coming into this lan with our current lineup. We plan on getting there a day or so earlier to get comfortable playing with each other side by side. Three of us have been playing for about 6 months together already. So we still have our core of players which should make the transition a lot easier.

Last week you guys suffered your worst loss of the season to the new compLexity roster. With coL's new roster and EG's consistent success, who do you feel is the top team in the United States at the moment and how do you think that Excello stacks up against them?

The loss vs. coL being so drastic had a lot to do with our de_nuke, it can be considered our worst map at the moment but we're working on it. It's hard to tell who the #1 team in the US is currently. coL and EG are both teams to respect however you put it. Clearly it looks as if coL has had a setback which can only put EG in more of a lead. When it comes to playing either one of them we have a lot of confidence, these are the two teams our eyes has been focused on for the last year.

Since the past few years the international scene has been dominated by European and Asian teams, although with recent top 3 placings at DreamHack and Arbalet Cup by American teams do you feel that CS in the U.S. is on the rise or still has a long way to go and if you could change one thing about the competitive scene in the U.S. what would it be?

The U.S. scene definitely has a long way to go. There's room for more top teams in the U.S. at the moment, all it needs is 5 dedicated players who are willing to put the work in. With that being said, at the moment it's hard to get good practice in the U.S. If that's not enough, the current top teams also put down a lot of upcoming teams making it even harder for them to succeed. If I could change one thing in the U.S. scene it would be the increase of bigger LAN tournaments and organizations willing to fund US teams.

With the beta version of CS:ProMod released, and ESEA now providing servers for the game, what are your thoughts on the game? What do you think are the most important things that CSP needs to succeed in the competitive scene, and will you yourself switch from 1.6 to CSP if major leagues and tournaments switched as well?

CSpromod had a lot of work done to it which I appreciate. I'm starting to see the light out of the cave they left us in. I still don't think the game is anywhere near ready yet to take over the 1.6 scene. If maybe in a year or two when the game is where it's destined to be, I could see myself switching over to CSpromod. Although a lot of players won't, I'm still one of the youngest, among most of these pros. I have a lot of time left in me.

Besides from ESEA, what plans do you and Excello have for the future, in terms of domestic and international events, and how do you feel you would stack up against the top tier European teams such as SK, mTw and Mousesports?

My team and I have goals a lot further then ESEA were just taking it one step at a time. We plan on attending as many LAN tournaments this year as possible. When it comes to the international teams I feel they're not that superior. Sometimes people make it seems as though they're coming in the server with more HP then us haha. Although they might have a different style of play here and there, we don't go into any matches without having an understanding of the team we're about to play. If that's not an option we go in playing our game to the best of our ability. I think we would do fine vs. international teams.

As always I like to end the interview with a totally random question so here it is: If you could trade places with any other person for a week, famous or not famous, living or dead, real or fictional, with whom would it be and why?

I don't know, I enjoy my life. LOL but uhm if I could trade places with anyone for a week, I'd have to go with Reggie Bush. So I can plow Kim Kardashian for a week and transfer as much as I could to my bank account. Then come back and be me. :]

Normally I would shout out my sponsors or current organization. The current 1.6 team of Excello is looking for a new organization to join. Please contact me at cj.banarsee@gmail.com with any inquires. Excello was unable to send us to ESEA finals, therefore look out for us under a different organizations name! Oh and we love and appreciate our supporters!

(Photographs copyright of GotFrag.com)