The second weekend of the 2016 Spring Championship of Online Poker presented players with plenty of opportunities to hit it big. Saturday afternoon's schedule included Event #22, a pretty standard No Limit Hold'em format except players were given access to huge stacks.
The medium buy-in version had a $109 ticket price and a $150,000 guaranteed prize pool. The structure change gave players five stacks of 5K virtual chips which they could load anytime they pleased. They could play one stack at a time or pile them up all at once at the start. If they didn't activate all their stacks by the start of Level 20, the system would do it for them.
The tournament drew a whopping 3,545 players to create a prize pool worth $354,500 with the last 450 earning some cash. The tournament was scheduled to pause at the end of Level 28 and 181 players were still around for a Day 2 return including Team PokerStars members Eugene Katchalov and Mickey "mement_mori" Petersen.
The extra deep stacks and slow structure allowed players to use all the weapons in their arsenal and they carefully made way through the tournament. They played 28 levels on the first day plus another six hours on Day 2 but still two tables remained with some top players.
Matthew "mjw006" Wakeman final tabled the Event #1-H, the big opening tournament last week but was unable to match his 2015 WCOOP Event 36 title. Dylan "Pokerl)eviL" Hortin had back-to-back seventh place finishes in the 2013 and 2014 WCOOP Main Events for over $200,000 each while Agentul05 has three Super Tuesday final tables to his credit.
All top players, none of which were able to make their way to this final table. They each dropped out with two tables still around and it was down to one when dyno52's [ah][8h] held against Lars Botman's [kd][9d] to send him out in 10th place.
Seat 1: dyno52 (15,356,571 in chips)
Seat 2: Purple Haze (8,060,832 in chips)
Seat 3: lil-lj1981 (10,682,232 in chips)
Seat 4: BernardoDG (5,149,686 in chips)
Seat 5: Jan "hownorez" Nakladal (14,347,176 in chips)
Seat 6: TerjePower18 (10,951,691 in chips)
Seat 7: #2slim4gym#H (9,565,360 in chips)
Seat 8: ragAAAila19 (11,384,676 in chips)
Seat 9: HYZENBURG (3,126,776 in chips)
Blinds: 120K/240K with 30K Ante
HYZENBURG dealt tough beat, eliminated in 9th
HYZENBURG hit the final table as the bottom stack of the bunch but found a big pair not long afterwards. He opened under the gun to 516,000 and Nakladal raised to 1.43 million from the cutoff.
HYZENBURG four-bet shoved for a bit under 3 million total and Nakladal called to put him at risk. [qd][qh] was the big pair HYZENBURG found and gave him a great chance to double up against [ah][qs]. Instead of a double, HYZENBURG saw the problem immediately on the [ad][5h][5s] flop.
The [kc] turn did nothing to improve his situation and HYZENBURG was knocked out in 9th place after the [5d] river ended his day.
#2slim4gym#H hashed out, eliminated in 8th
#2slim4gym#H was firmly in the middle of the pack for much of the latter parts of the tournament but lost an 8 million chip pot to Purple Haze one hand after HYZENBURG was KOd. He tried to get his chips back a few orbits later when he open-shoved for 4.9 million and lil-lj1981 responded with a shove of his own in the small blind.
BernardoDG let his big blind go and #2slim4gym#H was flipping with [ad][qc] against [9c][9d]. No magic for the two big cards as the board ran out [ks][7d][5h][4d][4s] to send #2slim4gym#H out in 8th place.
A-Q giveth and A-Q taketh away.
ragAAAila19 queened as well, eliminated in 7th
Keeping up with a theme of big hands with big queens, the next major pot involved two of them once again. This time, it was ragAAAila19 moving all-in for 4.2 million from the cutoff and lil-lj1981 called in the big blind with a chance for back-to-back knockouts.
ragAAAila19 was in trouble with [as][7d] against [qd][qh] and couldn't pair his overcard as the virtual dealer spread the [js][8d][4c][7c][8s] board. It was another queen hand, this one holding, and ragAAAila19 hit the rail in 7th place for $7,976.
BernardoDG follows the path of queens, eliminated in 6th
There were three quick eliminations at the final table before the remaining six settled in for an hour of grinding. TerjePower18 picked up a 12 million chip pot during that time and BernardoDG went to find a double for himself an orbit later.
The Brazilian three-bet shoved for 7.4 million after lil-lj1981 opened to 1.26 million. Nakladal saw something he liked and moved all-in over the top for 25.4 million next to get everyone else out of the hand. It's was queens again, this time BernardoDG holding [qc][qd] and they were dominated by Nakladal's [kh][ks].
BernardoDG couldn't find a queen or magic miracle cards to save his day as the board ran out [5h][5c][4c][jd][3c] to send another out with queens.
dyno52 chopped up, eliminated in 5th
The blinds were starting to catch up to dyno52 and TerjePower18 with each hovering around the ten big blind mark. The two short stacks put their chips in against each other but it was much ado about nothing. Each was holding the (now) popular A-Q and neither could find the double-loving four flush.
Four hands later, dyno52 was all-in again and Purple Haze called in the big blind to get a long, time bank sucking decision by lil-lj1981. The big blind eventually folded and it was a non-traditional race with dyno52's [5s][5c] ahead of the [kc][tc] of Purple Haze.
The [tc][7h][4d] flop put Purple Haze in the lead and dyno52 was the next knocked out when the board completed [7d][jh].
lil-lj1981 has a little quad trouble, eliminated in 4th
The comfortable period of the tournament was a thing of the past and the super short-handed table was costing players a lot in blinds and antes. lil-lj1981 found a four-handed baby pair and called all-in from the big blind after Purple Haze put in a sizable big blind bet.
lil-lj1981 held [2s][2h] and her ducks were looking for a miracle against [7c][7d] but received the exact opposite in the form of the [9s][7s][7h] flop. The quad-giving board left lil-lj1981 drawing completely dead to the pointless [3d] turn and [9c] river to exit the tournament in 3rd place.
Bad flop for TerjePower18, eliminated in 3rd
One hand after lil-lj1981 was eliminated, there was another battle of the blinds causing another elimination. It was Nakladal doing the damage when he open-shoved from the small blind with [ad][8c] and TerjePower18 called in the big with [as][ts].
A dominating hand for TerjePower18 but the eight-high [8d][6d][4d] flop swapped their fates. TerjePower18 was stuck hoping for a ten or some combination of running straight cards but saw nothing he liked on the [2h] turn or [qh] river to drop in 3rd place.
Seat 2: Purple Haze (38,137,252 in chips)
Seat 5: Jan "hownorez" Nakladal (50,487,748 in chips)
Blinds: 350K/700K with 87.5K Ante
Purple Haze immediately asked Nakladal if he was interested in making a deal and got a quick "no thx". Nakladal had the lead but it switched up on that first hand when Purple Haze dragged an 18 million chip pot without a showdown.
Seat 2: Purple Haze (47,324,752 in chips)
Seat 5: Jan "hownorez" Nakladal (41,300,248 in chips)
Blinds: 350K/700K with 87.5K Ante
Nakladal adds second COOP title with Event #22-M win
Purple Haze extended his lead through the early part of the heads-up match, stretching it to better than three-to-one for a while before losing traction. Nakladal stayed alive when he doubled with [ac][qh] versus [ah][jd], pulled back ahead in a 24 million chip pot with [4s][4s], then finished it off with a furtunate flop.
The final hand saw Nakladal open-shove his button with [kh][7s] and Purple Haze quickly called with the dominating [as][kc. His chance for a double up took a hit on the [ts][7h][5s] flop then it was all over when the board finished [4h] and [7c] to give Nakladal the hand and the tournament.
Purple Haze had a chance to earn his first COOP title but had to settled for runner-up money. This is the second SCOOP victory for Nakladal, joining along with his 2013 SCOOP $215 NLH 4-Max event win. He also has a bit of live tournament success including the time he made the last two tables during the 2013 World Series of Poker Main Event.
SCOOP-22-M ($109 NL Hold'em 5-Stack) results
Entrants: 3,545
Total prize pool: $354,500
Places paid: 450
1. Jan "hownorez" Nakladal (Czech Republic) $55,657.63
2. Purple Haze (Sweden) $41,476.50
3. TerjePower18 (Norway) $29,423.50
4. lil-lj1981 (Cyprus) $20,383.75
5. dyno52 (Canada) $15,176.14
6. BernardoDG (Brazil) $11,521.25
7. ragAAAila19 (Romania) $7,976.25
8. #2slim4gym#H (Estonia) $4,431.25
9. HYZENBURG (Canada) $2,836.00
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