Day 1A of the MSPT Season Final $1,100 Main Event at Canterbury Park attracted 216 players, which surpassed the $200K GTD in a single flight. The field was a who’s who of MSPT royalty, including former champs, Player of the Year winners, and those contending for the Kimo Sabe Mezcal MSPT Season 8 Player of the Year title.

After 14 levels of play, just 40 players bagged chips with 2017 MSPT Michigan State Poker Champion Chris Meyers and his stack of 278,000 leading the way.

The MSPT Canterbury Park marks the last opportunity for players to earn points on the Kimo Sabe Mezcal Player of the Year leaderboard. Chris Meyers came in with the lead (3,350 points), and he looks to hold onto it. However, Keith Heine, who sits in second place (2,967 points), isn’t going down easy as he made it through with a stack of 195,500.

Others to punch their tickets to Day 2 were Robert O’Connell (276,500), Todd Fisher (182,500), Sam Rubin (178,500), Charles Workman (168,000), two-time champ Jeremy Dresch (112,000), MSPT Season 2 Northern Lights champ Tom Stambaugh (41,000), and John “One Bullet” Morgan (41,000).

Others still in the POY race, provided they play Day 1B, include Mike Shanahan (2,700 points), Max Havlish (2,600 points), Ahmed Taleb (2,500 points), and “Big” Al Hedin (2,100).

Of course, not everyone was so lucky. Among those to fall on 1A were 2016 MSPT Michigan State Poker Champion Brett Blackwood, MSPT Season 6 Player of the Year Mark Hodge, eight-time World Series of Poker Circuit ring winner Josh Reichard, WSOP bracelet winner John Reading, 2016 MN Magazine Player of the Year Saad Ghanem, and Joe Matheson, who needs to make the money to keep his streak of cashing every MSPT season alive.

Friday was also special in that the Minnesota Poker Hall of Fame announced their 2017 inductee – MSPT founder and President Bryan Mileski. He was welcomed into the MN PHoF fraternity during the second break of the day, with John Morgan doing the honors on the microphone. You can read more about Mileski’s induction by clicking here.

Day 1B, which kicks off at 4 p.m. local time on Saturday, will offer players another opportunity to play. Someone who’ll be in action is legendary poker Twitter czar Kevin Mathers, better known to the community as Kevmath. He flew up from Atlanta on Friday to play in his first-ever MSPT event. Rest assured we’ll be keeping a close eye on his progress.

Be sure to join us tomorrow as we bring you all the action and eliminations straight from the floor of the latest MSPT Canterbury Park!