Graham Matthews opened to 24,000 from the cutoff and David Eldridge three-bet to 65,000 from the cutoff. The action folded back to Matthews, who four-bet jammed a stack of about 250,000. Eldridge called with a bigger stack.
Graham Matthews:
David Eldridge:
The nines of Matthews couldn't hold as the board ran out for Eldridge to pair his king and win the pot to eliminate Matthews, who merely gave an eyebrow raise and left. A table mate, meanwhile, had words about the call with king-jack, a play that might've given Tony Gouda an aneurysm had he seen it.
After another nine levels of play in the first-ever BetMGM Poker Championship at the ARIA Resort and Casino, just 26 players survived to bag and tag their stacks into Day 3.
Leading the pack is Canada's Albert Nguyen and rounding out the top three chip stacks are Paul Hoefer and Jake Daniels.
The big story of the day was that the event was able to surpass its $1 million guarantee, which was thanks to a plethora of Day 2 buy-ins. Today saw a further 133 entries, bringing the total to 343. This swelled the prize pool to a $1,097,600.
Notable names who decided to make the most of the late registration period included Ethan Yau, Landon Tice, Hossein Ensan and Jeremy Ausmus. However, none would last too long in the event.
2015 WSOP Main Event Champion Joe McKeehen had his afternoon cut short by Nick Sena, who floated the flop and spiked his gutshot straight draw. The pair then got their stacks in the middle and McKeehen left the room before the runout as he saw his pocket aces were drawing dead.
Once the late registration period was closed, it was swiftly announced that 44 players would make the money. Any player who ended up in the paid places secured themselves a payday of at least $6,256 while the eventual winner will walk away with the $224,236 up top.
Famous faces who busted in the money were WSOP bracelet winners Dejuante Alexander and Norbert Szecsi. Other names who cashed on Day 2 included Anton Wigg, Mario Navarro and BetMGM Poker Qualifiers Edward Leonard and Jonathan Lessin.
Michael Wang, Kevin Rabichow and Todd Ivens are some other names returning for Day 3. Joining them are BetMGM Poker Qualifiers Steve Bayyouk, Ryan Shinevare, Angel Lopez and Benji Felson. Those players will return to the PokerGO Studio on Saturday, June 25 at 12 p.m. to play Day 3.
BetMGM Poker Championship Day 2 Top Ten Chip Counts
Place
Player
Country
Chip Count
Big Blinds
1
Albert Nguyen
Canada
1,745,000
116
2
Paul Hoefer
Germany
1,190,000
79
3
Jake Daniels
United States
1,100,000
73
4
Shankar Pillai
United States
1,080,000
72
5
William McCracken
United States
990,000
66
6
David Eldridge
United States
950,000
63
7
Kevin Rabichow
United States
910,000
61
8
Todd Ivens
United States
900,000
60
9
Isaac Kempton
United States
890,000
59
10
Michael Wang
United States
795,000
53
As always, keep up to date with all action from this Championship event on PokerNews.