David Mock and Nick Salimbene shared the felt on the final table of the 2018 Spring Poker Open Championship final table, which was live streamed online for the world to watch.
Mock was eliminated fifth ($70,480) and Salimbene made it to third place ($113,272). Almedin Imsirovic was the eventual winner ($246,066) that year.
With them both in the field, they could find their way back to another final table!
Raymond Ross got his stack of about 30,000 all in pre-flop holding against the of Jonas Wexler. The dealer fanned the flop and Ross maintained the lead.
The turn was the improving Ross to top set and Wexler picked up a gutshot straight draw.
The hit the river and the table erupted as Wexler improved to Broadway to send Ross to the rail.
Stephen Song saw action fall on him, facing a 3,500 three-bet and elected to four-bet to 9,000. His opponent five-bet to 24,000 and Song quickly six-bet his 62,100 stack all-in. His opponent called and the two tabled their cards with Song at risk.
Stephen Song:
Opponent:
The dealer spread out on the board and Song's set of bullets took down the pot for a complete double.
Nick Palma raised to 1,500 from the cutoff and Soheb Porbandarwala re-raised to 5,000 from the big blind. With the action back on Palma he made it 15,000 and Porbandarwala moved all in for 37,400.
Palma quickly called turning over and Porbandarwala showed . The board ran out and Porbandarwala improved to the nut flush to double up.
"That wasn't the start I was hoping for" Palma said as Porbandarwala stacked his chips.
A player in late position raised to 1,600 and Ryan Van Sanford called from the hijack. Craig Varnell re-raised to 6,500 from the button and it folded back to the late position player who moved all in for 20,000. Van Sanford quickly folded and Varnell snap called.
Craig Varnell:
Opponnet:
The board ran out and Varnell's pocket queens held up to earn him the knockout.
Varnell is now one of the biggest stacks in the room with less than two levels of play left in the night.
The second flight of the $3,500 WPT Borgata Winter Poker Open Championship saw a total of 683 registration slips sold and when the dust had settled only 396 found a bag. Sitting atop the counts after eight levels of play is Francis Anderson with a stack of 300,100 which is good for the overall lead headed into Day 2.
Anderson flew under the radar for the better part of the day but found a heater during the last level of the night where he rocketed to the top of the chip counts. The Wappingers Falls, NY, native has over $600,000 in live career earnings with his second-best cash coming at the $ 3,500 WPT Seminole Rock & Roll Poker Open Championship in Hollywood this past November when he placed sixth for $111,895. Anderson had two six-figure scores in 2019 and is in a great spot to find his first of this year.
Fan-favorite Craig Varnell found the second largest stack of the flight after bagging 240,600, putting him third on the overall counts headed into Day 2. Three players that round out the top five stacks from this event are Kenneth O'Donnell (224,400), [Removed:150] (223,100), and Taylor von Kriegenbergh (219,400).
A star-studded field showed up for the last flight of the event including the likes of Joey Couden (197,700), Ian O'Hara (193,700), Amnon Filippi (185,500), Jonas Wexler (184,500), Michael Haberman (119,500), Sam Taylor (107,100), Ari Engel (90,800), Soheb Porbandarwala (82,800), Cliff Josephy (81,100), Vanessa Selbst (75,900), and Peter Walsworth (71,000).
Day 2 will begin at noon when players return to level nine and the late registration period will remain open until the start of level 11. The blinds will remain 60-minutes until the late registration period ends in which they will bump up to 75-minutes in length. The second day of this event will play until the end of level 16 and all players will then bag up and move onto Day 2 where the blinds will again increase, this time to 90-minutes.
The PokerNews live reporting team will be here to provide you with all of the updates, so stay tuned as all of the action unfolds.