Barny Boatman and Brandon Wong Join Exclusive Club of WSOP Bracelet Winners
Day 32 of the 2013 World Series of Poker was a busy one at the Rio All-Suite Hotel and Casino. In the afternoon, Tony Gregg emerged as the winner of the $111,111 One Drop High Roller for $4.8 million, denying Antonio Esfandiari of a repeat victory. Later in the evening, British poker legend Barny Boatman claimed his first WSOP bracelet in front of a rowdy rail at the ESPN feature stage, and longtime grinder Brandon Wong took down his own first WSOP title at the secondary table in the Amazon Room.
Event #49: $1,500 No-Limit Hold'em
In 2002, Barny Boatman narrowly missed out on winning his first World Series of Poker bracelet in a $2,000 buy-in pot-limit hold'em event, losing heads-up to Jay Sipelstein. It took him 11 years to have that opportunity again, and he made the most of it early Sunday morning.
Boatman bested a field of 2,247 to win Event #49: $1,500 No-Limit Hold'em. He defeated Brian O'Donoghue in a three-hour, back-and-forth heads-up match to win his first WSOP title and $546,080.
FINAL TABLE RESULTS
| Place | Player | Prize |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Barny Boatman | $546,080 |
| 2 | Brian O'Donoghue | $338,745 |
| 3 | Van Tran | $239,339 |
| 4 | Taras Kripps | $ 172,087 |
| 5 | Aditya Prasetyo | $125,372 |
| 6 | Robin Ylitalo | $92,550 |
| 7 | Paul Dasilva | $69,192 |
| 8 | Noah Sandler | $52,387 |
| 9 | Roger Lussier | $40,162 |
Day 3 started with 21 players, all of them in the money. Kevin MacPhee was the first player eliminated and he was followed to the cashier cage by a steady stream of eliminations. When Michael Quick’s pocket queens lost out to Paul DaSilva’s A♥K♥ – DaSilva turned a flush – the final table was set.
Roger Lussier was the first player eliminated at the final table; his A♠8♣ could not come from behind to beat the dominating A♥K♦ of O’Donoghue. Seven hands later, Noah Sandler’s tournament came to an abrupt end, again at the hands of O’Donoghue.
Start of Day 3 chip leader Robin Ylitalo finished in sixth place after a blind-versus-blind confrontation with Boatman. Boatman continued his rush of eliminating players when Aditya Prasetyo moved all in from the cutoff with pocket tens and Boatman made an easy call from the big blind with a pair of queens, which held up to eliminate Prasetyo.
With four remaining, a short-stacked Taras Kripps made a move with K♣4♦ from the small blind. Unfortunately for Kripps, O’Donoghue woke up with A♠10♣ in the big blindand made the call. Kripps caught a king on the turn of the 5♦J♣5♠K♦Q♦ board, but the river improved O’Donoghue to a straight and resigned Kripps to a fourth place finish.
Three-handed play lasted almost 30 hands. Van Tran lost a huge pot that left him with less than four big blinds, but he started to make a comeback by winning four all-in hands in a row. On his fifth attempted he jammed with J♣10♣ and O’Donoghue called with A♣K♥. A king on the flop and an ace on the river crushed Tran’s hand and the tournament went into heads-up play.
Boatman and O’Donoghue started the one-on-one battle within one big blind of each other. The match dragged on for 174 hands, but Boatman's loud cheering section hung our long enough to watch their mantake down his first bracelet.
Boatman opened to 240,000 and O’Donoghue three-bet to 550,000. Boatman made it 1.1 million and O’Donoghue moved all in. Boatman called with 10♠10♣ and was up against A♠K♠. A board reading 10♥2♥Q♥5♦7♠ sealed the deal for Boatman, who was mobbed by his rail, his brother Ross leading the celebrations that were sure to last deep into the night.
Event #50: $2,500 10-Game Mix (Six Handed)
Two months ago, Brandon Wong was one position away from winning his first gold bracelet at the WSOP Asia-Pacific in Melbourne, Australia. Unfortunately, his opponent was none other than Phil Ivey, and Wong was unable to beat the world's greatest player heads-up.
Wong got another chance on Saturday, and he didn't let this one slip through his grasp. Wong dominated Sebastian Saffari during heads-up play to grab hold of the title, the coveted gold bracelet, and the $220,061 in first-place money.
FINAL TABLE RESULTS
| Place | Player | Prize |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Brandon Wong | $220,061 |
| 2 | Sebastian Saffari | $135,932 |
| 3 | Philip Sternheimer | $87,397 |
| 4 | Christopher George | $57,954 |
| 5 | Scott Abrams | $39,564 |
| 6 | Loren Klein | $27,792 |
The day began with 20 hopefuls returning to the felt chasing the dream of becoming the next WSOP champion. Several players were in contention when the day began, but one-by-one they hit the wayside before the final table. Konstantin Puchkov (18th), Robert Williamson III (17th), Tom McCormick (14th), Bruno Fitoussi (13th), 2004 WSOP Main Event champion Greg Raymer (11th), Mike Wattel (10th), and Brian Tate (9th) all fell before the final table was reached.
The players combined at the final seven and took their seats at the secondary feature table in the Amazon room. The official final table was reached rather quickly as Daniel Makowsky was eliminated after a series of 2-7 triple draw hands gone awry.
The players took a break and returned to finish out the 2-7 triple draw orbit. It was in these few short hands that Loren Klein saw his tournament come to an end. Klein fell at the hands of start-of-day chip leader Scott Abrams when the latter made eighty-six on the third draw, leaving Klein drawing dead before even sweating his final card. The field then played five-handed for some time before action finally came to a head. Unfortunately for Abrams, he was the next to fall when he could not improve against Saffari's flopped Broadway-straight during a preflop all in in pot-limit Omaha.
Christopher George fell shortly after Abrams, having a relatively poor stud-8 round that ended with him being slain by Wong. George's fourth-place finish left the remaining competitors in a three-handed spar that lasted for quite some time. Philip Sternheimer was the shortest stack of the three for quite some time and continued to drop in the counts as the match went on. Despite doubling in limit hold'em he was unable to gain any momentum and lost many of those chips a mere few hands later. Sternheimer finally saw his tournament come to an unfortunate end during a hand of Badugi against Wong. Sternheimer continued to push and stayed pat since the deal, but tabled a hand with two spades once all of the money went in. Regardless of his misread of his hand, Wong made a 5♦3♥2♠A♣ on the final draw to finally send Sternheimer packing.
Wong and Saffari went to battle for the bracelet with Wong holding a slight chip lead heading into a round of stud. Wong shot out of the gate and never looked back, winning two key stud hands that propelled him into a dominating chip advantage. The two continued to clash with Wong more often than not coming out on top. The match finally came to an end when a severely short-stacked Saffari shipped all in from the button in no-limit hold'em. Wong snapped him off and tabled two red aces - an absolute domination of Saffari's 8♦6♠. Despite picking up an open-ended straight draw on the turn, Saffari did not improve and Wong became the latest champion of the 2013 WSOP.
Event #51: $10,000 Ladies No-Limit Hold'em Championship
The final table of the Ladies Event of the 2013 WSOP is set, and Shana Matthews leads the way with 497,000 in chips. Chris Priday, the chip leader after Day 1, sits in second place with 455,000.
FINAL TABLE CHIP COUNTS
| Place | Player | Chips |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Shana Matthews | 497,000 |
| 2 | Chris Priday | 455,000 |
| 3 | Eleanor Gudger | 398,000 |
| 4 | Connie Bruce | 360,000 |
| 5 | Kristen Bicknell | 316,000 |
| 6 | Amanda Baker | 277,000 |
| 7 | Leanne Haas | 272,000 |
| 8 | Julie Monsacre | 188,000 |
| 9 | Cindy Kerslake | 100,000 |
This event attracted 954 players, and only 122 returned for Day 2. Five of them left empty handed, as the tournament paid the top 117 places. The field was pared down to 27 after only about five and half hours of play, and from there it took less than three more hours to reach the final nine.
Many well-known players survived the first day, but busted out before the final table was set: Jackie Glazier (83rd), Marsha Wolak (74th), Liv Boeree (54th), and Danielle “dmoongirl” Andersen (44th), to name a few. Perhaps the most famous name in the field today was Barbara Enright. Enright is member of the Poker Hall of Fame, has won three WSOP bracelets, and is the only woman to make an official final table at the World Series Main Event. Enright made a deep run, but was eventually eliminated in 25th place.
The remaining nine players return Sunday at 1 p.m. Join us here at PokerNews.com for live updates as we bring you all the action as the players determine the next World Series of Poker bracelet winner.
Event #52: $25,000 No-Limit Hold'em (Six Handed)
After nearly 11 hours of play Day 2 of Event #52: $25,000 No-Limit Hold'em (Six Handed) came to a close early Sunday morning. With the elimination of Brandon Meyers on the stone bubble, 18 players have guaranteed themselves a minimum of $53,781, and the chip leader heading into the final day is Max Lehmanski. Lehmanski entered Day 2 with the most chips, and he ended the day in the same exact spot, bagging 1,982,000 chips.
The only other players to bag seven figures were Stephen Chidwick, Phil Galfond, Dani Stern, and Steve Sung, who was one card away from being the bubble boy himself when he got more than a half a million chips in the middle preflop with ace-king off-suit against the aces of Igor Kurganov. Sung made a four flush when the turn and river went diamond-diamond, doubling to over 1.1 million chips. Sung seemingly ran hot the entire day, busting Kyle Julius with ace-five against ace-jack prior to the bubble, and calling all-in with just ace-high on a seven-high flop only to chop when the turn and river put a straight on the board.
Also making Day 3 were Kevin Eyster, Todd Terry, Shannon Shorr, Ogjen Sekularac, David "Bakes" Baker, Marvin Rettenmaier, Fabian Quoss, and Christian Harder. Sekularac, despite one of the other shortest stacks in the room, was the one to bust Meyers. Sekularac won a race with two tens against Meyers' ace-jack to burst the bubble and end the day.
Joining Meyers on the rail today were a host of other notables, including Byron Kaverman, Rachid Ben Cherif, Zachary Clark, Max Steinberg, Eugene Katchalov, Jason Mercier, JP Kelly, Tobias Reinkemeier, Niklas Heinecker, Yevgeniy Timoshenko, and the winner of the $111,111 One Drop High Roller, Tony Gregg, who made his way over to this event immediately after he finished his winner's interview with Lynn Gilmartin.
Play will resume on Sunday at 2 p.m. Be sure to follow PokerNews.com for coverage of this and every bracelet event at the 44th annual World Series of Poker.
Event #53: $1,500 No-Limit Hold'em
When registration closed for Event #53 on Saturday, it was officially the largest $1,500 NLHE event of the series thus far outside of the Millionaire Maker. The event drew an impressive 2,816 entrants, generating a prize pool of $3,801,600. First place will pay $665,397, and leading the remaining 319 players is Alban Juen with 168,300. He is followed by Arden Cho (124,800) and Chance Kornuth (120,300).
Among the notables still in the field are David Vamplew (98,800), Noah Vaillancourt (72,900), 2012 Octo-Niner Steve Gee (59,100), Brent Hanks (53,500), Danny Suied (41,000), Barry Greenstein (36,400), Faraz Jaka (26,100), Matt Waxman (25,000), and Paul Volpe (16,900).
Also taking part in the action today was Antonio Esfandiari, fresh off of his fourth-place finish in the One Drop High Rollers No-Limit Hold'em. Unfortunately, Esfandiari didn't survive the day. Also among those who took to the felt today, but who will not return on Day 2, include Lauren Kling, Darryll Fish, Maria Ho, Phil Laak, Matt Stout, and Luke Vrabel.
Play is set to resume at 1 p.m. local time on Sunday when the remaining players begin their trek toward the final table. Join PokerNews.com for all of the highlights.
On Tap
Event #51: $10,000 Ladies No-Limit Hold'em Championship and Event #52: $25,000 No-Limit Hold'em (Six Handed) are scheduled to play down to a winner on Sunday, and Event #53: $1,500 No-Limit Hold'em will attempt to reach a final table. Two more events get underway: Event #54: $1,000 No-Limit Hold'em and the much-anticipated Event #55: $50,000 Poker Players' Championship.
Video of the Day
2012 WSOP Main Event champion Greg Merson has arrived in Las Vegas feeling fresh for the business-end of this year's WSOP. The series is already off to a blazing start for the champ as he witnessing his friend Anthony Gregg win the $111,111 One Drop High Roller.
Be sure to follow our Live Reporting page for continuing coverage of every event at the 2013 World Series of Poker, and follow PokerNews on Twitter for up-to-the-minute news.
