Stefan Schillhabel Wins LHPO Super High Roller

January 19, 2018

Frank Op de Woerd

A lot of the high rollers started the year at the PCA in the Bahamas and were right on their way to Hollywood after, making their way to the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino for the 2018 Lucky Hearts Poker Open. The popular event has a big batch of tournaments on offer, one of them being the $50,000 Super High Roller.

Stefan Schillhabel took down the event, beating 24 players to take home the trophy and $493,000 first-place prize. He beat Adrian Mateos heads up, with Justin Bonomo, Nick Petrangelo, and David Peters also cashing.

Position	Player	Country	Prize
1	Stefan Schillhabel	Germany	$493,000
2	Adrian Mateos	Spain	$308,125
3	Justin Bonomo	United States	$197,200
4	Nick Petrangelo	United States	$135,575
5	David Peters	United States	$98,600

With a $1,000,000 guaranteed, the event needed 20 runners for the casino not to have to provide an overlay. With 19 runners for the last $50,000 event, that wasn't a given. In the end, 25 entries were made into the event, so the guarantee was easily surplussed.

Tollerene officially bubbled the $50,000 Super High Roller.

After 14 levels of play, six players remained in the prestigious event. While bagging and tagging was scheduled, they decided to add an extra level of play for the night to increase the chance of the bubble bursting as just five players were to make the money. With Ben Tollerene down to just a couple of big blinds, the players and tournament organization decided to give him two more orbits to see if he could spin it up, or get eliminated. It would turn out the poker gods had the latter in mind for Tollerene.

In the first hand of Level 16, Tollerene moved in for just under three big blinds. He got called by both Adrian Mateos and Nick Petrangelo. The side pot remained empty as Mateos and Petrangelo checked down the board, both eventually turning over a full house sevens full of sevens. Tollerene, who had entered the pot with the best hand, turned out to be outdrawn by both of his opponents and officially bubbled the $50,000 Super High Roller.

That left five players, all guaranteed a min cash of $98,600. They returned the next day to play down to a winner, in the following seat order:

Seat	Player	Country	Chip Count
1	Adrian Mateos	Spain	664,000	(55 bb)
2	Nick Petrangelo	United States	478,000	(40 bb)
3	Stefan Schillhabel	Germany	359,000	(30 bb)
4	David Peters	United States	294,000	(25 bb)
5	Justin Bonomo	United States	705,000	(59 bb)

In only the third hand of play, the shortest of the stacks got it in. David Peters pushed over an open from Mateos. Peters, who made a deep run in the PCA Main Event (11th, $75,640), had the worst of it with ace-five suited. Mateos, who made an even deeper run in the same event (4th, $372,600), had ace-queen and flopped a queen to strengthen his lead. Peters had a gutshot to a wheel but missed on the turn and river to go out in fifth place, good for $98,600.

Nick Petrangelo was next to go, getting it in with pocket fives to Justin Bonomo's king-jack. Bonomo flopped a jack to outrun Petrangelo and had to settle in fourth place for $135,575.

While Justin Bonomo had doubled first and knocked out Petrangelo second, he was still the first one out next. He first doubled Schillhabel with ace-nine to ace-jack but doubled back with queen-jack to the deuce-four of Mateos. Still, he had just 20 big blinds after those encounters and finally went under with ace-deuce to Schillhabel's ace-nine. Both players improved on the flop, turn, or river, and Schillhabel's ace-nine proved best.

"I think it was the toughest final table I’ve ever played."

The heads-up took just under 2.5 hours, with the lead changing at least three times. In the final hand, Stefan Schillhabel had a two-to-one lead over Adrian Mateos as the two got it in on eight-seven-three-ten board. Mateos had flopped top pair with queen-eight which had become second pair on the turn, only to see Schillhabel turn over a flopped two-pair with seven-three.

The river six was a blank and Mateos went out in second place while Schillhabel posed for the winner photos.

"And that final table, I think it was the toughest final table I’ve ever played," Schillhabel told SHRPO reporter Allen Rash over on the SHRPO blog.

With this cash, Schillhabel has overtaken Koray Aldemir as the number 10 on the German All Time Money List with $8,632,702 in tournament earnings. He also jumps from position 86 to 76th on the All Time Money List, overtaking players like Barry Greenstein, Jerry Yang, Scott Blumstein, Andrew Lichtenberger, and Freddy Deeb. He's just $51,904 behind Johnny Chan.

Stefan Schillhabel