It was a memorable Friday around the Rio as the 2013 World Series of Poker welcomed back into its fold a former champion and crowned another who defeated one of the legendary players of the game to earn his honors.
Event #12 – $1500 Pot Limit Hold’em
Coming to the final table, Eric Crain had been on a roll. Making the final table of Event #8, the $2500 Eight Game Mixed tournament, Crain was looking to do a bit better this time around. Sitting on a 620,000 chip stack, Crain was in a prime position to do that, but he would have to face down five-time WSOP bracelet winner Allen Cunningham, Jaspar Brar, Lev Rofman and others if he was to make this tournament his first bracelet win.
Crain got off to a decent start, knocking off a short-stacked Jean-Nicolas Fortin in ninth place only five hands into the final table to extend his lead. In five more hands that lead would disappear as he doubled up Anthony Harb, who just happened to wake up in the small blind with pocket Aces when Crain raised with pocket Jacks. Cunningham, who would inherit the lead, would lose it himself almost twenty hands later against Timothy Reilly (in a situation very similar to Crain, Cunningham’s pocket tens failing to catch against Reilly’s pocket Aces).
Although there were these doubles, the action over the first 40 hands was relatively sedate, until Brar and Reilly decided to clash. After a Reilly raise, Brar three bet out of the big blind and Reilly pushed out a four bet. Brar decided to make a stand at this point, moving all in and Reilly made the call (a situation that has been seen several times at this year’s WSOP). Reilly was in difficult shape, his A-K way behind Brar’s pocket Aces and, although he caught a King on the flop and three to a flush on the turn, the blank river gave Brar the victory. After the chips were counted down, Reilly was left with only 25K in chips and was gone the next hand.
Brar would knock Crain further down the ladder when his A-J caught against Crain’s pocket fives, and Crain was left on life support. Although he would double to get back over the 100K mark, Cunningham would end Crain’s day in sixth place when his pocket fives survived against Crain’s Big Chick.
Only three hours into play, five men were left for the title with Cunningham holding down the lead. Rofman, however, wasn’t ready to let the veteran pro waltz to his sixth bracelet, knocking off Anthony Harb in fifth. After Brar took down Kenneth Shelton in fourth, the three remaining players (Brar, Cunningham and Rofman) were within 200K in chips of each other.
After battling for about 15 hands, Cunningham would get fortunate in eliminating Brar from the tournament. On A K-10-8 flop, Brar moved all in and Cunningham nearly beat him into the pot, tabling K-10 for the flopped two pair against Brar’s pocket Aces. Once the board failed to pair or bring an Ace for him, Brar was out in third place and Cunningham went to heads up with Rofman with a million chip lead.
Unfazed by sitting across from the world renown pro, Rofman slowly began to work his way back into the match. Over 25 hands, he would draw nearly even with Cunningham, but Cunningham would knock him back down over the next ten. Rofman would double up twice to pull back to the lead before the penultimate hand.
With Rofman barely in front, Cunningham and Rofman saw a 9-J-5 flop, which saw Rofman bet out and Cunningham moved all in. Rofman made the call and he was shockingly in the lead with his K-Q against Cunningham’s K-8. Once a seven came on the turn and a Queen on the river, Rofman had won the matchup against Cunningham to take the gold.
1. Lev Rofman (Las Vegas, NV), $166,136
2. Allen Cunningham (Las Vegas, NV), $102,819
3. Jaspar Brar (Edmonton, Alberta, Canada), $68,332
4. Kenneth Shelton (Dallas, TX), $50,709
5. Anthony Harb (Canton, MI), $38,055
6. Eric Crain (Murphysboro, IL), $28,839
7. Nicolas Halvorson (Vaughn, WA), $22,050
8. Timothy Reilly (Natick, MA), $16,994
9. Jean-Nicolas Fortin (Saint-Augustin, Canada), $10,320
Event #13 – $5000 Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo
20 players came back on Friday with a shot at taking down one of the bigger buy in non-No Limit events on the schedule, but only Mike Matusow would be left by the end of the evening to claim his fourth WSOP bracelet.
Within the first level of play, the field would be whittled down to thirteen players, with such notables as Timothy Finne, Joe Tehan, Brian Hastings and Eli Elezra taking the walk to the cash out cage. The 2011 champion of this tournament, Eric Rodawig, could not make the final table in succumbing in tenth place and, after Tuan Vo was eliminated by David “Bakes” Baker in ninth, the final table was set.
At this point, Yuval Bronshtein was the chip leader, but the remainder of the leaderboard looked ominous. Baker, Matusow, Mike Leah, Tony Cousineau, Gavin Smith, Matthew Ashton and a short stacked Vladimir Shchemelev rounded out the field and, indicative of the skill level of the final table, they wasted little time getting down to business.
Shchemelev and Smith would depart within the first fifteen hands as Baker passed Bronshtein for the lead. It would get worse for Bronshtein as Matusow would bet action on every street except the last against him to rocket up to 555K in chips. Bronshtein, meanwhile, sunk down to 334K.
After a break for dinner, Cousineau and Bronshtein were eliminated quickly as Mike Leah mounted an assault on the top of the leaderboard. With his elimination of Baker, Leah cracked the 1.2 million chip mark, but Ashton would snag some chips from him to hold the lead three-handed. Matusow lurked within striking distance of the twosome and, when he struck, he did it quickly.
Matusow would bring the action to heads up by eliminating Leah in third place, but he was a 3:1 underdog as they started play. He would basically bring the match to even by getting Ashton to check-call every street when Matusow made a straight and a low to scoop the pot, then move into the lead when his two pair was better than Ashton and there was no low. On the final hand, Ashton rode a (4-2) 7-2-8-10 (8) to Seventh Street, but Matusow bested him with a (9-4) 9-2-K-5 (K) for two pair also to give “The Mouth” his fourth WSOP bracelet.
1. Mike Matusow (Henderson, NV), $266,503
2. Matthew Ashton (Liverpool, the United Kingdom) $164,700
3. Mike Leah (Las Vegas, NV), $108,412
4. David “Bakes” Baker (Rochester Hills, MI), $79,078
5. Yuval Bronshtein (Tel Aviv, Israel), $58,835
6. Tony Cousineau (Daytona Beach, FL), $44,543
7. Gavin Smith (Guelph, Ontario, Canada), $34,268
8. Vladimir Shchemelev (St. Petersburg, Russia), $26,757
