Nicholas Burris Turns Cancelled Trip into $65,435 RGPS Tulsa Payday
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Usually, when travel plans fall through, it’s bad news. But for Nicholas Burris, the cancellation turned into a blessing worth $65,435.
The RunGood Poker Series Tulsa Grand Prix $800 Main Event champion decided to head to the Hard Rock Hotel And Casino Tulsa after a friend reminded him of the tournament. It proved a wise call, as Burris topped a field of 469 entries to claim the title and a share of the $328,300 prize pool.
Final Table Results
| Place | Player | Country | Prize (USD) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nicholas Burris | United States | $65,435 |
| 2 | Dexter Wise | United States | $43,627 |
| 3 | Wesley Jones | United States | $32,627 |
| 4 | John Heckenkamp | United States | $24,104 |
| 5 | Bobby Randolph | United States | $18,190 |
| 6 | Mika Evans | United States | $13,869 |
| 7 | Freeman Allen | United States | $10,684 |
| 8 | Terry Harrell | United States | $8,318 |
| 9 | Jon Kreder | United States | $6,544 |
Burris, a husband and father of three children, shared with PokerNews that he has not been as active in the poker world the last couple of years as he and his wife raised a young child, but the opportunity to play the RGPS Tulsa Grand Prix Main Event presented itself, and he took it.
Burris stated, “My oldest (son) loves poker, so he’s going to love the ring, and he’s just going to be grinning it up after this. It’s going to be hilarious.”
Burris became a force to reckon with down the stretch of the final table. He endured a six-handed stalemate that lasted over an hour and a half before another elimination occurred.
Burris secured a key double up when he called the bluff of Mika Evans on the river to vault past three and a half million in chips. Burris was a tornado at the final table after that point, denting his opponent’s stack with regularity as he knocked out Evans in sixth, Bobby Randolph in fifth, John Heckenkamp in fourth, and finally Dexter Wise to win the title.
Burris shared that once the final table got down to four-handed, he felt confident in his ability to close out the win. This first-place finish was the second-highest cash of his career, surpassing his best recorded RGPS result according to The Hendon Mob when he won the 2019 RGPS Main Event in Council Bluffs. This win puts Burris over $400,000 in earnings, according to his recorded earnings, and may prompt the accomplished poker player to visit the felt just a bit more.
“I have a little more right to go play,” Burris said jokingly about his poker schedule in the future.
Day 2 Action
The opening hours of the final day of play saw a flurry of all-ins and eliminations as players rose and fell in the standings as they chased a slice of the over $300,000 prize pool. Several notables fell during the opening rounds, including Eric Bunch, Forrest Kollar, Marvin Donaldson, Craig Savage, and Rob Gardner.
By the time the field hit the final three-table redraw, Day 1a chip leader John Lopez was still one of the top stacks in the room, as well as Day 1b chip leader Bobby Randolph, who was chip leader as they hit the final 27 players.
Randolph continued his success after he duked it out with Andre Allen in a big hand during the 10,000/20,000 level that saw Randolph grow his stack to over two million in chips.
Randolph rode that wave to the final table, but it was Wesley Jones who entered the final nine as the chip leader with John Heckenkamp and Burris within striking distance. Jones maintained that chip lead until Burris put a dent in his plans when Jones saw his pocket queens cracked by Burris, who flopped a full house. It was from that point forward that Burris began to assert himself and put together a strong run to take down the title.
