Day 1B of the 2018 MSPT Wisconsin State Poker Championship attracted 269 runners to Potawatomi’s Hotel & Casino, which along with 1A’s 156 brought the current field up to 425 entries with Saturday’s Day 1C flight still to go.

After 15 levels of play, just 38 players remained with Byron Ziebell and his stack of 355,000 leading the way. That is a good bit ahead of 1A chip leader James McArthur, who bagged 274,500. Also bagging big was Rich Alsup, the second player to ever win his way into the MSPT Hall of Fame and the MSPT Season 7 Player of the Year, who advanced with 331,000.

Others to bag big stacks Paulie“Walnuts” Bianchi (313,000), Jim Duda (282,000), Steven Goetsch (239,500), and Nick Pupillo (219,000).

They were joined by Matt Buhler (195,500), Sam De Silva (150,000), Thomas Peebles (126,000), MSPT Season 9 Canterbury Park champ Rob Wazwaz (117,000), Alex Ziskin (102,000), Craig Trost (73,000), and WSOP Colossus II champ Ben Keeline (53,000).

Among those to try their luck on 1B but come up short were defending champ Richard Bai, recent MSPT Meskwaki champ Taylor Howard, WSOP bracelet winner John Reading, MSPT Season 6 POY Mark Hodge, MSPT Hall of Famer Kou Vang, WPT champs Keven Stammen and Ravi Raghavan, and former MSPT champs Dan Bekavac, Keith Heine, Jeremy Dresch, and Jason Seitz,

Day 1C, the third and final flight, will get underway at 3 p.m. local time on Saturday, with the third and final flight, Day 1C, taking place at the same time on Saturday. The surviving players from all flights will return at 11 a.m. on Sunday to play down to a winner.