On Thursday, action in Event #4 of the 2010 World Series of Poker (WSOP) Europe schedule, a £10,000 No Limit Hold’em High Roller Heads-Up tournament, ground to a screeching halt after Gus Hansen and Jim “Mr_BigQueso” Collopy were deadlocked at one match apiece. With both combatants taking to the felt in the WSOP Europe Main Event on Friday for Day 1B, the question of when the duo would resume their best-of-three final loomed large. Yesterday, it was revealed that the two would take to the felts on Sunday at 6:00pm local time.
Three hours later, Hansen walked away with his first WSOP bracelet after edging out Collopy in the event’s rubber match to earn a bounty of ₤288,000. The Main Stage at the Casino at the Empire played host to the final match. On the tournament’s last hand, Collopy 3bet all-in with K-4 of spades and Hansen called with a wired pair of fours. Collopy picked up a flush draw on the turn, but no king or spade fell, giving Hansen his first WSOP victory and, more importantly, a sleek gold bracelet.
In one of the key hands of the final battle between Hansen and Collopy, the former shoved all-in on a board reading 8-J-J-5-2. Collopy made the call in a heartbeat and showed Q-J for trip jacks, while Hansen tabled ducks for a rivered full house. Hansen pulled out to a 2:1 lead in chips following the two-outer, forcing Collopy to battle back for his tournament life.
Hansen ultimately let Collopy draw back to even, but the veteran pulled out the win in fashionable style. En route to his dramatic showdown with Collopy, Hansen bested a minefield of poker talent by winning heads-up matches against Max Steinburg, Mark Everett, 2009 WSOP November Niner and fellow Full Tilt Poker pro Phil Ivey, Neil Channing, and Andrew Feldman.
Collopy jumped out to an early lead against Hansen in match #3 after leading out for 450,000 on a board of 6-5-3-9-J. Hansen tanked before making the call and Collopy turned over pocket aces. Hansen mucked and Collopy shot up to 2.8 million in chips for a 2:1 lead. However, he could not fend off the three-time World Poker Tour champion.
Hansen now owns nearly $1 million in WSOP cashes. His two claims to fame on the WSOP felts prior to Sunday’s bracelet win were a $123,000 haul for final tabling the $50,000 HORSE Championship at last year’s WSOP and a 61st place showing in the 2007 Main Event in Las Vegas for $154,000. Collopy had never made a final table in a WSOP tournament prior to Event #4 in London.
The tournament received love from ESPN cameras in attendance covering the Main Event. The network is in the midst of airing the Las Vegas Main Event every Tuesday night. This week, Day 6 of the $10,000 buy-in tournament will play out, with a feature table headlined by Matt “mcmatto” Affleck. The online poker pro took 80th in last year’s WSOP Main Event and made a strong run once again in 2010. You can catch all of the action beginning at 9:00pm ET.
Stay tuned to Poker News Daily for the latest from the 2010 WSOP Europe festivities in London.
