PokerStars Championship Bahamas: Nick Petrangelo Looking for First $100K Win After Bagging Day 1 Lead
Nick Petrangelo raced ahead of his high-rolling rivals, turning 250,000 into 861,000 and taking the chip lead at the conclusion of Day 1 of the $100,000 Super High Roller at PokerStars Championship Bahamas.
Hot on Petrangelo's heels is Steve O'Dwyer, who has been among the most successful players on the high roller circuit in recent years. He ended with 801,000. Daniel Dvoress (720,000), Connor Drinan (639,000) and Jason Koon (624,000) round out the top five.
One of the biggest hands Petrangelo played came at the expense of Christoph Vogelsang late in the day. In the last level, with the big blind at 5,000, Petrangelo opened early for 12,000 and got action from Vogelsang in the big blind. On a board that ran out 3♣3♠4♦8♦5♦, Vogelsang check-called three barrels, the last for 91,000, and got shown two eights for top full house by Petrangelo.
Petrangelo has posted good finishes in $100Ks before. He finished second in a World Poker Tour Alpha 8 event in 2015 for just over $1 million and seventh in the $111,111 One Drop last year for $628,679 but has yet to grab his first win. With 36 players bagging chips and 50 total entries logged — 11 were reentries — there's still a long road ahead for Petrangelo.
Other players making it through included PokerStars Team Pros Jason Mercier and Daniel Negreanu, as well as 2015 WSOP champion Joe McKeehen, 2016 GPI player of the year David Peters, and EPT Grand Final High Roller champions Charlie Carrel and Mustapha Kanit.
Popular American actor Kevin Hart also made it through to Day 2. The popular comedy star kept up a running banter with his tablemates all day but did wind up needing a reentry after he was down to 16 big blinds and check-shoved an eight-eight-nine flop with pocket fives only to see Koon turn over jacks. No five appeared for Hart but he bought straight back in. He ended up losing about half of his second starting stack as he ended with 130,000.
Anthony Zinno, Timothy Adams, Erik Seidel, Isaac Haxton and Bill Perkins were a few of the players who went bust on Day 1. The latter three reentered and bagged and everyone still has the option to buy a stack until the start of Day 2. For live coverage on Saturday, head on over to the PokerStars blog. PokerNews will continue to bring feature coverage right here.
Here's who'll return for Day 2. Blinds will be 3,000/6,000 with a 1,000-ante.
| Player | Country | Chip Count |
|---|---|---|
| Nick Petrangelo | United States | 861,000 |
| Steve O'Dwyer | Ireland | 801,000 |
| Daniel Dvoress | Canada | 720,000 |
| Connor Drinan | United States | 637,000 |
| Jason Koon | United States | 624,000 |
| Sam Greenwood | Canada | 605,000 |
| Leo Yan Ho Cheng | Canada | 571,000 |
| Koray Aldemir | Germany | 552,000 |
| Jason Mercier | United States | 517,000 |
| Byron Kaverman | United States | 461,000 |
| Sean Winter | United States | 450,000 |
| Dario Sammartino | Italy | 423,000 |
| Joseph McKeehen | United States | 405,000 |
| David Peters | United States | 393,000 |
| Charlie Carrel | United Kingdom | 379,000 |
| Orpen Kisacikoglu | Turkey | 377,000 |
| Dan Colman | United States | 363,000 |
| Erik Seidel | United States | 299,000 |
| Fabrizio Gonzalez | Uruguay | 295,000 |
| Stephen Chidwick | United Kingdom | 284,000 |
| Dan Shak | United States | 281,000 |
| Christoph Vogelsang | Germany | 250,000 |
| Anthony Zinno | United States | 250,000 |
| Ben Heath | United Kingdom | 250,000 |
| Timothy Adams | Canada | 250,000 |
| Isaac Haxton | United States | 248,000 |
| Adrian Mateos | Spain | 227,000 |
| Pascal Lefrancois | Canada | 211,000 |
| Cary Katz | United States | 193,000 |
| Daniel Negreanu | Canada | 188,000 |
| Ivan Luca | Argentina | 188,000 |
| Justin Bonomo | United States | 187,000 |
| Vladimir Troyanovskiy | Russia | 171,000 |
| Bill Perkins | United States | 170,000 |
| Kevin Hart | United States | 130,000 |
| Mustapha Kanit | Italy | 128,000 |
| Paul Newey | United Kingdom | 124,000 |
| Sergio Aido | Spain | 120,000 |
| Benjamin Tollerene | United States | 107,000 |
Jason Koon, who knocked out Kevin Hart and survived the day with 624,000 making him fifth in chips, told us about his intention to do a poker focused biohacking seminar with one of the greatest mind coaches in the world this April:
Photos: Neil Stoddart/PokerStarsBlog.com
