Larry Pileggi Wins Poker Night in America Pittsburgh Poker Open Championship for $71,782

Chad Holloway PR & Media Manager

Dec 04, 2013 2 min read Last updated Jun 20, 2022

This past weekend, Poker Night in America continued with its third stop ever — the Pittsburgh Poker Open Championship at the Rivers Casino. The $1,000 buy-in no-limit hold'em Main Event was the first major televised poker tournament ever held in Pittsburgh, and even managed to create the largest tournament prize pool in Rivers Casino history.

The Main Event took place over a four-day period and was the final event on an 11-day schedule. The tournament attracted some notable names in Greg Raymer, Dan O’Brien, and Darvin Moon, but it would be local play Larry Pileggi that walked away with the $71,782 firs-place prize and a crystal trophy presented by the Rivers Casino.

Place	Player	Hometown	Prize
1st	Larry Pileggi	Pittsburgh, PA	$71,782
2nd	David Tannenholtz	Las Vegas, NV	$35,890
3rd	Joseph Couden	Columbus, OH	$20,098
4th	Douglas MacKinnon	East Amherst, NY	$17,227
5th	Donald Trenney	Moon Township, PA	$15,792
6th	Daniel Hill	Pittsburgh, PA	$12,920

It took just over three hours for Pileggi to plow through the final table, which included defeating Las Vegas’ Dave Tannenholtz in heads-up play. What’s more, Pileggi’s wife, Leah, was on the rail to share in the special moment. She and her husband look to inspire young people by sharing their poker and life travels together in her popular blog called “It's a wonder-filled life,” which can be read at leahpileggi.blogspot.com. Needless to say, there will be a Poker Night in America post sooner than later.

This was the second time the Rivers Casino has hosted a series called the Pittsburgh Poker Open. The previous “Summer Series” was held last August. The Rivers Casino is located in Pittsburgh's picturesque Chateau neighborhood on the western banks of the Ohio River. The host casino is conveniently situated near Heinz Field (home of the NFL's Pittsburgh Steelers), PNC Park (home of MLB's Pittsburgh Pirates), and is adjacent to the Carnegie Science Center.

In addition, the Rivers Casino hosted a special invite-only cash game on Tuesday that was filmed for television on a delayed broadcast. The lineup featured Raymer, O’Brien, Moon, 2009 World Series of Poker champ Joe Cada, 2005 WSOP runner-up Steve Dannenmann, and Wisconsin businessman Larry Ormson, who walked away a $28,000 winner and was voted the most entertaining player at the table.