The penultimate day of the PokerStars North American Poker Tour Las Vegas $1,650 Main Event has concluded with just seven players remaining in the fight for $268,945 and the title of first NAPT Main Event champion in 12 years. Leading the way is California's Sami Bechahed as he looks to add to his $941,234 in tournament earnings.
Bechahed got most of those chips after winning a big pot as the night closed out against poker commentator and four-time bracelet winner Nick Schulman, the most accomplished player at the final table with nearly $17 million in earnings.
The next most accomplished player remaining is Spain's Sergio Aido, who will have to fend off East Coast grinder David Coleman and Ping Liu, who is fresh off a victory down the street in the PokerGO Studio where he bested Aido during heads-up play (Schulman finished fourth in that event).
Rounding out the remaining seven are California's Sandeep Pallampati and New Jersey's Jonathan Borenstein, who earlier this year finished fourth in the Borgata Return for a career-best $368,324.
NAPT Main Event Remaining Players
| SEAT | PLAYER | COUNTRY | CHIP COUNT | BIG BLINDS | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sami Bechahed | United States | 10,570,000 | 106 | |
| 2 | Nick Schulman | United States | 4,390,000 | 44 | |
| 3 | Ping Liu | United States | 3,095,000 | 31 | |
| 4 | David Coleman | United States | 1,610,000 | 16 | |
| 5 | Sandeep Pallampati | United States | 4,300,000 | 43 | |
| 6 | Sergio Aido | Spain | 6,670,000 | 67 | |
| 7 | Jonathan Borenstein | United States | 2,200,000 | 22 |
Day 3 Action
There were 34 players who returned for Day 3 and battled across five tables inside Resorts World Las Vegas. The number of players and tables both dwindled steadily as the likes of Seunghwan Lee and Girish Reknar hit the rail, the latter of whom was propelled by a double knockout yesterday before falling early in Day 3 in 23rd place.
Jeremy Pekarek got a bit out of line with five-three offsuit by three-betting and barreling twice before folding the river against Liu. After the elimination of David Jackson, Pekarek fell in 21st place when his ace-jack didn't hold against Coleman's king-ten.
Ryan Yu fell to Liu to bring in the two-table redraw before last woman standing Mikela Shkurta fell to Schulman as her ace-ten was pipped by the poker commentator's Big Slick.
Popular Japanese poker vlogger Masato Yokosawa came up short of the final table as he ran ace-ten into Aaron Massey's cowboys to fall in 13th place. Matthew Wantman was next out after losing half his stack to Aido before getting it in against the same opponent and losing out with king-eight against queen-jack.
Next out was Liran Betito, whose elimination was set up by a six-bet pot that saw him doubling up Coleman before falling to Aido.
Massey lost a flip with jacks to the ace-king of Bechahed to set up the unofficial nine-handed final table. The 2021 Poker Players Championship runner-up Ryan Leng bowed out on the official final table bubble as his ace-jack failed to improve against Schulman's pocket eights.
Day 2 chip leader Anthony Dianaty was the last player to fall on Day 3 as he ran jacks straight into the aces of Sami Bechahed.
Day 4 will kick off at 12:30 Vegas time on Level 30 with blinds of 50,000/100,000 with a 100,000 big blind ante. PokerNews will continue reporting on a 30-minute delay to avoid spoilers of the PokerStars stream.
Remaining Payouts
| Place | Prize | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | $268,945 | |
| 2 | $168,175 | |
| 3 | $120,130 | |
| 4 | $92,410 | |
| 5 | $71,080 | |
| 6 | $54,680 | |
| 7 | $42,060 |
Stay tuned as the PokerNews live reporting team will be back on-site at Resorts World tomorrow for continued coverage of the NAPT Main Event. Be sure to check out the NAPT Las Vegas portal in the meantime.
