The third and final starting flight of the MSPT Golden Gates attracted 209 entrants to Black Hawk, Colorado. Along with Day 1a’s 98 and 1b’s 183, that brought the total field to 490 entrants. After 13 levels of play, Alex Greenblatt led the surviving 40 players with a stack of 330,000.
To put that in perspective, Scott Stewart bagged the chip lead on Day 1a with 351,400, while Jackson McAllister held the Day 1b chip lead with 257,000.
Greenblatt has $646,826 in lifetime tournament earnings with his best score being $145,898 for a runner-up finish in the 2013 Heartland Poker Tour Main Event here in Black Hawk. As for the MSPT, Greenblatt has just one cash, which was a 291st-place finish or $2,546 in this summer’s event at the Venetian.
Others to advance from the Day 1c field with big stacks were Jim Boone (299,600), Henry Billete (237,500), Adam Wilbur (232,900), and two-time MSPT champ Carl Carodenuto (205,200). They were joined by such players as Will Givens (192,600), April’s MSPT Golden Gates runner-up Jason Vanstrom (113,000), and MSPT Season 7 Player of the Year contenders Rich Alsup (81,200), TJ Thondup (45,100), and Rodger Johnson (36,700).
Unfortunately, not everyone could make it through the night. Among those to fall were Tyler Corbett, Travis Northrope, David Gutfreund, Bobby Sanoubane, “Wild” Bill Romer, Reza Yazdi, and two-time World Series of Poker bracelet winner David Warga.
At 11 a.m. on Sunday, the surviving players from all flights -- 92 players (13 from Day 1a; 39 from 1b; and 40 from 1c) – will merge into one field and play down to a winner. We’ll be there every step of the way to bring you all the action, so be sure to join us then.