21 Advance from Day 1b of the Oklahoma State Championship of Poker

Two starting flights have come and gone for the return of the 2025 Oklahoma State Championship of Poker $800 Main Event. A total of 261 hopefuls made their way to Hard Rock Casino Tulsa for a final opportunity to etch their names into the Oklahoma poker history books.

In total, 417 entries were recorded, creating a prize pool of $291,900 as many of the area’s best players tried their luck over the past two days.

Unlike Day 1a, a full 18 40-minute levels were completed today, with just 21 players punching their tickets to Sunday’s restart, where they will join the 11 survivors from yesterday.

Ending the night atop the counts was John Smith, who spent much of the day near the top of the leaderboard before bagging 748,000.

Close behind in second place was Johnnie Place with 738,000, while John Reynolds rounded out the podium with an even 700,000 — as a trio of Johns finished the night strong. However, all of them trail William Scarsdale, who ended Day 1a with the overall chip lead at 914,000.

End of Day 1b Top Ten Chip Counts

Rank	Player	Chip Count
1	John Smith	748,000
2	Johnnie Place	738,000
3	John Reynolds	700,000
4	Grant Hinkle	647,000
5	Jim Wilson	643,000
6	Allan Lee	457,000
7	Anthony Finley	414,000
8	Zac Campbell	393,000
9	Yordanos Mebra	392,000
10	Eric Bunch	376,000

Other notables to advance today include Grant Hinkle (647,000) and Eric Bunch (376,000) as they look to add to their already impressive resumes.

The day got off to a fast start as the attendance surpassed the first flight by the time the players took their first break.

By the close of registration, only 30% of the field remained, but the pace of play then slowed considerably.

25 hands of hand-for-hand would be required before a player was finally eliminated. In a multi-way limped pot, the big blind put her final two blinds into the middle on the flop, but was left with just jack-high on the river as she fell to the top pair of Rodney Spriggs, who had plenty to say throughout the day but was unable to find a bag after min-cashing.

The final 32 players will return at 12 p.m. on Sunday for the restart. Play resumes with 2:26 remaining in Level 17 with blinds of 5,000/10,000 and an average stack of 391,000. The action will continue in 40-minute levels until a winner is crowned.

Payout information is still being finalized and will be posted as soon as it becomes available. The seat draw for Day 2 is posted below.