Gary Gelman Conquers Record-Breaking 2022 PokerNews Cup at Golden Nugget ($202,725)
The 2022 PokerNews Cup has reached its end after a very successful tournament drew a huge field of 1,245 entries to blow past the $1 million guarantee and create a prize pool of $1,207,650, which made it the largest prizepool in Golden Nugget Las Vegas history.
At the end of the five days of action the winner of the $202,725 grand prize was Gary Gelman of Brooklyn, New York, who went from one of the short stacks at the start of the day to the winner.
This win is by far the largest in Gelman’s career as he has been recording poker cashes since 2009, the majority of which are in the medium range according to The Hendon Mob.
“This is definitely my biggest cash and this has been a long time coming.," he said.
Gelman wore a Ukrainian flag draped around him throughout the final table and he was asked to expand on that after his win.
“It is special to me. I was born in Ukraine, I lived there with my parents when I was a kid. I also married a Ukrainian a few years ago. It has been real hard these last few months. We were actually in Kiev in February when the war started. We had to make our way out and we brought her mother back with us.”
Showing that the situation is very close to him and he continued, “When I made the final table I thought I would represent and luckily one of my friends on the rail had a flag and I decided to wear it today”. And represented it well he did with his impressive victory.
One of the tenants of Gelman’s game is the importance of having fun as he said prior to the final table and afterwards he added to that: “Many players are robotic now and so are their games. I understand there is money involved but money is not everything and I just like to play cards and have fun.”
2022 PokerNews Cup Final Table Results
| Place | Player | Country | Prize Money |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Gary Gelman | United States | $202,725 |
| 2 | Daniel Hinh | Australia | $142,175 |
| 3 | Forrest Kollar | United States | $92,095 |
| 4 | Eoin Starr | Ireland | $68,185 |
| 5 | Patrick Caulfield | United States | $51,555 |
| 6 | Davic Von Schnehen | United Kingdom | $41,650 |
| 7 | Levi Klump | United States | $34,380 |
| 8 | Scott Stewart | United States | $27,120 |
| 9 | Steven Sarmiento | United States | $20,275 |
Day 3 Path to Victory
Gelman’s run started with a short stack on Day 3 but he was able to spin it up as things progressed. He entered heads-up play facing a 2:1 chip deficit against Daniel Hinh, the young Australian who also started the day as the short stack but found his way on the winning end of many spots to become a force.
The match became a two-hour battle as Hinh was never able to fully put the hammer down on Gelman, who chipped back slowly after a series of small hands. There was actually not any one huge defining hand during heads-up play that shifted the chips, but rather Gelman winning a series of pots and Hinh being unable to stem the flow. Gelman turned things completely after about an hour to have a 2:1 chip lead himself. Hinh would cut back some from there to make it even again, but Gelman would have the last laugh as his top pair held out versus the flush draw of Hinh on the final hand.
How did a joker end up on the flop in this hand?
Action of the Day
The day began with three big stacks and six short stacks to create an interesting dynamic in play. There would not be an elimination for the first two hours as the short stacks won all of the all ins.
Eventually, Steven Sarmiento was the first to go in ninth place as his jacks lost to a turned queen to hit king-queen. Scott Stewart went out the door shortly after that in eighth place to make the two largest career earners the first two to exit the stage.
Levi Klump then went out in seventh place after his aces were cracked by a flopped set of tens.
David Von Schnehen exited next after he had started the day as one of the three big stacks but was never able to get anything going and was taken out in sixth place.
The eliminations came quickly after that.
Patrick Caulfield would be eliminated in fifth place after he had a roller-coaster final table, starting as a short stack then going to the chip leader at one point before falling back down to short stack and going out in fifth.
Start of day chip leader Eoin Starr hit the rail in fourth place after he lost a few big all ins early on to cut his big stack away. He was able to scrap for a bit to survive a few more places but he would ultimately meet his demise.
Forrest Kollar ended his deep run in third place after he stayed steady for most of the day and was able to ride his comfortable stack to third where he would be swallowed up by the two larger stacks after very a brief three-handed play period to set up the aforementioned heads-up play.
That wraps things up for the 2022 PokerNews Cup. Thank you for following along and we look forward to having more PokerNews Cup events in the future. However, the 2022 Grand Poker Series at Golden Nugget rolls on until July 3. Click here for a look at the remaining schedule.
