Gavin Smith opened with a raise from under the gun, Steven Burkholder three-bet from the cutoff, then the player in the small blind four-bet. Smith and Burkholder both called.
The flop came . The SB bet, Smith called, Burkholder raised, and the other two called. The turn was the . It checked to Burkholder who bet, and both of his opponents called.
The river was the . It checked to Burkholder who bet again, the small blind called, and Smith got out. Burkholder showed , but was beaten by his opponent's .
Gavin Smith raised from middle position, and the big blind defended to see a flop.
It came , and the big blind check-raised to two bets. Smith bet-raised to three bets, and the big blind flatted. They both checked through the turn and river.
"Jack-high," the big blind said. Smith showed up his own miss, , but his nothing was better than his opponents. That pot pushes Smith up just a little, sitting now with 39,000.
With the board showing and several bets already in the middle, a player in middle position bet, Team PokerStars Pro Alexandre Gomes of Brazil raised, and his opponent called with his remaining chips.
Gomes showed for an open-ender, but already had the best hand against his opponent's . The river was the , and another player hit the rail, murmuring that oft-heard refrain in poker room's: "I just couldn't get a hand."
Gomes, meanwhile, gets himself other hand, and moves to 62,000.
The last one-hour level of the night begins, and with it the last 30 minutes of no-limit hold'em. Some players -- especially a few of the shorter-stacks -- welcome one last shot at no-limit before play concludes as an opportunity to build back up quickly before night's end.
Indeed, a few minutes before the last level concluded, Jeffrey King, looking down at his below-average stack of 12,000, was heard to say "I would like no-limit right now." A tablemate nodded in agreement, and joked that it had crossed his mind to play the last hands of the level more slowly so as to get to NL without having to play as many limit hands. There was a lengthy debate at another table earlier this evening when a short-stacked player did, in fact, play slowly at the end of a limit round so as to avoid having to pay the bigger blinds.
It has been interesting all day to hear players discussing their relative preference for limit or no-limit. By far, it seems, the greater percentage of our players prefer and are more comfortable with no-limit than limit.
On a flop of we watched a heads-up battle between Aaron Steury and Liv Boeree. Steury had check-raised Boeree from 3,200 to 8,800 when we walked up. Boeree promptly three-bet it up to abot 25,000, only to see Steury move all in right back over the top.
Boeree snap-mucked, and she's left with just under 12,000 now.
Jim "Mr_BigQueso" Collopy has had an up-and-down day, thriving during the no-limit rounds for the most part, but struggling during fixed-limit play. Just now, however, no-limit wasn't so good to him.
A player was all in against Collopy for 18,200 with versus Collopy's . The board went , and Collopy -- who at one point today was flirting with reaching 100,000 -- slips to 25,000.
We saw chips being pushed into the pot, so we hustled over to Table 4 to see Pat Pezzin all in for about 20,000 against Andreas Hoivold. The flop showed , and Pezzin had in front of him. He was in good shape to double up; Toivold's cards showed .
Pezzin dodged his opponent's outs as the turn and river filled out the board. That marks his double up to over 40,000, and he's all smiles as he and Andy Bloch make small talk at the table.
Darus Suharto has been nursing a below-average stack for much of the latter part of the day. Finally down to 7,700, he found a hand worth playing and put all his chips in the middle preflop. His opponent tabled , while he turned over .
The board went , and amid his tablemates' joshing him for being a nit, Suharto doubles back to 15,000.
. The SB bet, Smith called, Burkholder raised, and the other two called. The turn was the 
. It checked to Burkholder who bet, and both of his opponents called.
. It checked to Burkholder who bet again, the small blind called, and Smith got out. Burkholder showed 
, but was beaten by his opponent's 
.![[user66118]](/img/avatars/avatar.svg){kind=avatar}
turn and 
river.
for an open-ender, but already had the best hand against his opponent's 
. The board went 
, and Collopy -- who at one point today was flirting with reaching 100,000 -- slips to 25,000.
in front of him. He was in good shape to double up; Toivold's cards showed 
.
and river 
, while he turned over 
, and amid his tablemates' joshing him for being a nit, Suharto doubles back to 15,000.