With so many skilled players turning up to play week after week, Super Tuesday final tables almost always have a compelling storyline. Sometimes it's a past champion attempting to repeat, or a massive comeback, or even repeated showdowns between the same two players. Almost never, though, does a single final table involve all three of those things. Tonight's final table was an outlier, though, and an entertaining one at that, leading to a new career-best PokerStars score for Jerry "Perrymejsen" Ödeen, already winner of more than $1 million in PokerStars tournaments.

Things started, as they do every week, 2:00 p.m. ET. This week's tournament drew 436 entries for a $436,000 prize pool and $82,840 scheduled for the winner. As the tournament went to break just before its fifth hour of play began, the money bubble was near. With 66 players in and 63 paid, the United Kingdom's Wallyayay led the way with 600K in chips, approaching four times the 165K average. At the other end of the ladder were 10 players in the danger zone with 12 big blinds or less. Within 15 minutes three of them lost their grip on the tournament, with Israel's DEdgge bursting the bubble in 64th place and guaranteeing a minimum of $1,918.40 to everyone else who managed to hold on.

After almost seven and a half hours of play the final table bubble finally arrived, and when it did, it didn't look like it would last too long. Sweden's Jerry "Perrymejsen" Ödeen was holding less than three big blinds and in need of a miracle just to stay alive. He caught one on his big blind, making three of a kind with [9h] [4d] when a pair of fours landed on the board to beat 2014 WCOOP finalist huiiiiiiiiii's [Ah] [Kc].

That hand wasn't the last time those two players would meet heads-up, and it sparked more than 20 minutes of tense hand-for-hand play as both tables that finally came to an end when dadowiec's [Jh] [Jd] faced down Festivuss's [As] [Qs]. A jack on the flop made a set for dadowiec, knocking Festivuss out in 10th place ($5,232) to set up this final table with blinds and antes at 15K/30K/4.5K:

Seat 1: Jerry "Perrymejsen" Ödeen (426,598 in chips)
Seat 2: AATheLeach (332,904 in chips)
Seat 3: dadowiec (1,409,303 in chips)
Seat 4: orange6 (2,175,582 in chips)
Seat 5: pulbier (1,497,682 in chips)
Seat 6: huiiiiiiiiii (834,145 in chips)
Seat 7: Jonathan "OMGjonyctt" Concepcion (3,249,555 in chips)
Seat 8: XstepBYstepX (690,038 in chips)
Seat 9: marlin5555 (284,193 in chips)

Just as a coin flip decided the final table lineup, another one determined the first player to depart from it. marlin5555, who took 9th in the Super Tuesday last spring, re-raised all-in with a pair of sevens after orange6, a 2010 SCOOP & 2012 Sunday Warm-Up winner, opened with a small raise in early position. orange6 called with [Ah] [Jd], caught a jack on the turn, and marlin5555 might just have experienced déjà vu exiting in 9th place ($7,237.60)

Orange roll

orange6 won a million-chip pot on the next hand after flopping a set of jacks and getting 2013 WCOOP winner dadowiec to call down on all three streets before mucking on the river. Aside from that, though, the trend was for pots to be taken down on the flop or turn with a bet or raise. AATheLeach held on with less than 10 big blinds through that stretch before making a final stand, shoving for 148K under the gun with [9c] [7c]. That raise nearly stole the pot, but Perrymejsen only had to call 108K more in the big blind with [Ts] [3s]. That would have been enough to win unimproved, but the trey on the flop of the [Jd] [6s] [3d] [4h] [Qs] cinched the 364K-chip pot and AATheLeach left in 8th place ($9,810).

A few hands later orange6 won another significant pot. It came in a blind-versus-blind showdown, with orange6 holding [As] [Ks] in the small and pulbier in the big with [Ac] [Qs]. The action went raise-shove-call, with pulbier at risk for 1.02M. Neither player paired their kicker, but the three spades on the [Tc] [9s] [6s] [5s] [7c] board made a flush for orange6. That won the 2.1M-chip pot, and pulbier bowed out in 7th place ($14,170). It's the second solid performance on the big stage in April for pulbier, who was part of a five-way chop in Sunday Warm-Up last week.

dadowiec, down to just nine big blinds, picked up pocket aces on the next hand and doubled to 827K when original raiser XstepBYstepX called dadowiec's all-in with [8h] [8s]. The board didn't make a set, leaving XstepBYstepX the new short stack with 638K. Four hands later XstepBYstepX had the misfortune to run into another overpair, this time with [Td] [Tc] against huiiiiiiiiii's [Qd] [Qs]. Just like before, there was no set in the cards, and XstepBYstepX finished in 6th place ($18,530).

Four hands later orange6 struck again. This time the past SCOOP winner opened for a small raise under the gun with [As] [Ks], getting a call from dadowiec in the big blind. The action after the [8s] [9s] [Ad] flop went check-bet-shove, and orange6 called to see dadowiec shown down [Ac] [Tc]. The [9h] turn changed nothing and the [Qs] river made a flush to seal the 1.48M-chip win for orange6. With that, dadowiec departed in 5th place ($23,980).

Four for the score

It was now 10:17 p.m. ET and these four players were still in the hunt for this week's Super Tuesday title:

Seat 1: Jerry "Perrymejsen" Ödeen (827,501 in chips)
Seat 4: orange6 (4,207,984 in chips)
Seat 6: huiiiiiiiiii (2,447,814 in chips)
Seat 7: Jonathan "OMGjonyctt" Concepcion (3,416,701 in chips)

With only Perrymejsen's 20-big-blind stack feeling much pressure from the slow structure, the pace of play would be pegged to the Swede's performance. And on the first hand of four-handed play, he evened things out enough to make sure that performance wasn't dictated by the whims of the deck. Perrymejsen picked up [Ac] [9d] and opened for 85K on the button, which orange6 dipped into the time bank to consider before re-raising to 225K. Perrymejsen then shoved for 821K and orange6 called with [As] [7h], losing out on the [8c] [Td] [Kd] [Ah] [7h] board and boosting Perrymejsen's stack to 1.7M chips.

Another 43 hands took the foursome to the tournament's tenth and final hour, which boosted the blinds and antes to 30K/60K/9K. Even that jump couldn't force anybody into an error, though, and they continued four-handed for another level. huiiiiiiiiii and Perrymejsen drove the action for the bulk of that time, with orange6 and 2013 WCOOP winner/two-time Super Tuesday champ Jonathan "OMGjonyctt" Concepcion both getting involved from time to time. The largest pots all went to Perrymejsen until, with blinds and antes at 40K/80K/12K, orange6 took a stand and called with [Ad] [Qh] after limping in the small blind only to see huiiiiiiiiii move all-in for 1.64M. huiiiiiiiiii's [2d] [2s] was a slim favorite and stayed in danger the whole way, but emerged a 3.33M-chip winner after the board came down [8h] [Tc] [6h] [6c] [7s].

That left orange6 with five big blinds, all of which ended up going in from the big blind three hands later with [As] [4s]. But huiiiiiiiiii was ahead again, this time with [Ad] [Kh]. Neither player improved on the [3d] [Qh] [Th] [7c] [9d] board, eliminating orange6 in 4th place ($34,008).

To the end of the road

After 71 minutes of four-handed play the blinds and antes had already advanced twice, so when they went up again the pressure was turned up on the shortest stack. In the end it took just 11 minutes to reduce the field a final time. Concepcion, who had been sitting back for most of the final table and had only recently been reduced to 1.2M chips by the shorthanded action, had to make a move - and quickly. Sitting in the small blind with [Kc] [8h], he moved all-in - and Perrymejsen called, also holding [Ks] [8s].

That pot was split, and Concepcion still needed a boost. Two hands later he picked up [Ks] [8d] again, this time in the big blind, and he chose to call with it when huiiiiiiiiii jammed from the small blind. Unfortunately huiiiiiiiiii had [Ad] [Kh], and when the board ran out [3d] [6c] [3s] [5d] [Qs] Concepcion was denied a third Super Tuesday win in 3rd place ($44,690).

It was now 11:39 p.m. ET and two players who had squared off on the final table bubble two hours earlier were facing each other heads-up for a Super Tuesday title. They immediately agreed to talk about a deal with their stacks looking like so:

Seat 1: Jerry "Perrymejsen" Ödeen (4,779,622 in chips)
Seat 6: huiiiiiiiiii (6,120,378 in chips)

They settled on a deal giving huiiiiiiiiii $73,710 and Perrymejsen $65,169, with $5,000 on the table for the winner. With that done, they played out the last 14 hands of the tournament.

Ten of those went Perrymejsen, including all three of the key pots. The first, won with a raise on the river after huiiiiiiiiii made a probing bet, was worth 1.8M and put Perrymejsen in front by 10 big blinds. The second was still small after huiiiiiiiiii semi-bluffed on a royal flush draw with the [Qs] in the hole and [8d] [As] [Ts] [Ks] on the board, but ballooned to 2.9M after huiiiiiiiiii fired one more time for 888K once the blank [3c] hit the river. Perrymejsen called with [Ad] [6h] for top pair, moving up to 7.65M chips and dropping huiiiiiiiiii's stack to 3.2M.

Five hands later huiiiiiiiiii picked up pocket nines in the big blind and re-raised to 550K after Perrymejsen min-raised on the button. The action went shove-call from there, and Perrymejsen showed down [Qc] [Qd]. No nines showed up, and the chip-and-a-chair comeback was complete.

huiiiiiiiiii took home the biggest share at $73,710.76, with the extra money on the table giving winner Jerry "Perrymejsen" Ödeen a new career PokerStars-best score of $70,169.24. Not bad for a guy who already had more than $1 million in earnings here. Congratulations to both players for their strong performances!
4/26/16 Super Tuesday ($1,050 NL Hold'em) results
Entrants: 436
Total prize pool: $436,000
Places paid: 63

1. Jerry "Perrymejsen" Ödeen (Sweden) $70,169.24
2. huiiiiiiiiii (Austria) $73,710.76*
3. Jonathan "OMGjonyctt" Concepcion (United Kingdom) $44,690
4. orange6 (Israel) $34,008
5. dadowiec (Poland) $23,980
6. XstepBYstepX (United Kingdom) $18,530
7. pulbier (Netherlands) $14,170
8. AATheLeach (Netherlands) $9,810
9. marlin5555 (Canada) $7,237.50
*Reflects the results of a two-way deal that left $5,000 in play for the winner