Ngo Leads 18 Survivors in Opening Flight of Event #5

The 2014 Seneca Niagara Summer Slam continued Monday with the start of Event #5, a $125 buy-in no-limit hold’em event with a $50,000 guaranteed prize pool. The special event features six separate starting flights across three days with the survivors advancing to Day 2 on Thursday to play down to a champion.

The first flight began at 11 a.m. ET and when registration closed after eight levels a total of 100 entries were tallied. Only 18 survived the day, with Lam Ngo and his stack of 234,300 leading the way.

Ngo used a hyper-aggressive preflop style to pressure opponents all day long and will be in great shape when he returns for Day 2 on Thursday. Among those chasing him will be Alex Rivera, who finished second in chips with just over 150,000.

Rivera scooped a big pot late in the day to vault up the leaderboard. Rivera and another player saw a queen-high flop with three spades and Rivera called a bet of 10,000 with the . An hit the turn and Rivera’s opponent moved all in for more than 20,000 and Rivera called with his flush. He needed to fade another spade against his opponent’s , and the river bricked.

Some of the others advancing in the first flight were Brian Bowen, David Paluch, Tom Lewandowski, and hometown favorite Lou Tomassi. All of the players have the option of playing other flights and attempt to finish with a bigger stack, but players will only be permitted to advance with their biggest stack from one flight.

Be sure to stay tuned to our continuous coverage of Event #5 throughout the week!