Gregory Kolo Leads As Final Table Finishes With Eight Players
Ten more 60-minute levels were played today in Event #12 of the 2014 World Series of Poker, the $1,500 Pot-Limit Hold'em and during that time the 69 returning players were reduced to only eight. Gregory Kolo leads those eight back into battle on Thursday afternoon.
The money bubble burst early on in the day and actually resulted in two players being paid because Geffrey Klein and Jacob Bazeley both busted on different tables while the tournament was in the hand-for-hand stage and therefore split the 63rd place money of $2,443.
Some of the players who reached the money places but failed to progress to Day 3 included Marvin Rettenmaier, Ryan D'Angelo, Tony Gregg, Joseph Cheong, Keven Stammen, reigning world champion Ryan Riess, David Peters, Darryll Fish, and the legendary Phil Ivey who would have been still in the tournament had Anton Smirnov not caught a lucky turn to send the nine-time bracelet winner to the rail.
Towards the end of the night, the remaining 10 layers sat down at the unofficial final table, which quickly became official when the aforementioned Smirnov crashed out.
The final nine battled it out for the best part of 90 minutes before a relative cooler sent Phil Collins home earlier than he would have wished.
A raise to 24,000 in late position by Kuza Oshima was met with calls from Gregory Kolo (button) and Dan Goldman (small blind) before Collins (big blind) raised to 120,000 from the big blind. Oshima folded, Kolo potted, Goldman folded and Collins called.
Collins turned over 
and was in a whole world of pain against the 
of Kolo. His situation got worse when the flop came down 
followed by the 
turn and 
river.
That left the final table with eight players and they return to the Amazon Room of the Rio at 1:00p.m. on Thursday to play for the title of champion, which comes with a $169,225 prize and a coveted gold bracelet.
Here's how the players will line up:
| Seat | Player | Chips |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Empty | |
| 2 | Ryan Schoonbaert | 322,000 |
| 3 | David Martirosyan | 266,600 |
| 4 | Ahmed Amin | 242,000 |
| 5 | Tom McCormick | 137,000 |
| 6 | Kazu Oshima | 425,000 |
| 7 | Dean Bui | 151,000 |
| 8 | Gregory Kolo | 633,000 |
| 9 | Dan Goldman | 335,000 |