The $1,100 buy-in, $3.5 million guarantee MSPT Venetian Event as part of the Championship DeepStack Poker Series attracted 4,411 runners which made it the largest poker tournament in both MSPT and Venetian history!
On Friday, the final 39 players returned to play down to a winner. After 10 hours on Day 3, it was 44-year-old emergency medicine technician David Levine of Rancho Cucamonga, California who walked away the champion. The scheduled first place payout was $548,341 but Levine and runner-up Davila struck a deal heads-up that netted Levine $495,500.
“I’m pretty ecstatic,” he said shortly after the win. “When there were five people left and we were on break, I was down in chips. Even if I busted at that time I was still $150K up, so I felt pretty lucky, I felt good. I knew if I wanted to win it I’d have to use whatever cards that I got, and I was lucky enough to get quite a few good hands. I had a good run. I had some monumental hands that helped me get right back into the tournament.”
Final Table Results
1 David Levine (Rancho Cucamonga, CA) $495,500 ($548,341 original payout)*
2 Felipe Davila (Lima, Peru) $405,500 ($352,659 original payout)*
3 Lou “AP” Garza (San Antonio, TX) $266,645
4 Scott Massimiano (Scottsdale, AZ) $197,833
5 Owen Crowe (Nova Scotia, Canada) $150,525
6 Tyreem Williams (Philadelphia, PA) $109,668
7 Ken Rawlinson (Riverside, RI) $81,714
8 Derek Wolters (Las Vegas, NV) $64,511
9 Shane Martin (Chicago, IL) $51,609
10 Young um (Los Angeles, CA) $43,007
*Denotes heads-up chop
Among the hundreds to cash were MSPT Season 7 FireKeepers champ Aaron Massey (83rd - $6,795), 2017 MSPT Wisconsin State Poker Champ Richard Bai (108th - $5,505), MSPT Season 5 Running Aces champ Mark Sandness (115th - $5,505), Minnesota’s all-time money leader Blake Bohn (139th - $5,505), MSPT Season 4 Player of the Year Pat Steele (202nd - $4,215), Kimo Sabe Mezcal MSPT Season 8 Player of the Year Chris Meyers (236th - $3,612).
On Day 3, 29 players fell short of making the final able including Sammy Aweida (11th - $43,007), WPT champ Iaron Lightbourne (12th - $43,007), James Rodriguez (17th - $30,105), Eric Maier (27th - $17,203), Nick Pupillo (29th - $14,622), Mike Del Vecchio (32nd - $14,622), and Phong Nguyen (39th - $12,042).
The first elimination of the final table came when Young Eum shoved his extreme short stack with kings only to fall to Tyreem Williams’ Big Slick when an ace hit the flop. Not long after, Shane Martin moved all in for his last 12 bigs with the 
and was flipping against Owen Crowe’s 
. The board ran out 
and Martin had to settle for ninth place.
Derek Wolters was the next to go after four-betting all in with kings and getting called by AP Garza’s ace-queen. An ace on the flop and another on the river sent Wolters out the door in eighth place for $64,511.
It was at that point one of the most interesting hands of the final table occurred. It happened when Ken Rawlinson shoved his last three big blinds all in from the button holding the 
and Felipe Davila three-bet jammed the small blind with the 
. Williams woke up with the 
in the big and called off. The board ran out 
and Davila scored the double elimination.
Crowe was next to fall when his pocket fives failed to hold against Lavine’s queen-ten of clubs, and Scott Massimiano followed him to the rail when he flopped top pair holding the 
on a 
flop. Unfortunately for him, Levine had flopped two pair with the 
and held when the 
bricked the turn followed by the on the river.
After Garza bowed out in third place – the result of his king-eight failing to overcome Davila’s pocket queens – a heads-up deal was struck. Lavine and Davila agreed to each lock up $405,500 and leave $90,000 and the trophy to play for.
Not long into their match, Levine raised to 2.5 million with the 
and Davila called holding the 
. The 
flop saw Davila check and Levine bet 2 million. Davila check-raised all in for 26 million and Levine called. Neither the 
turn nor 
river changed a thing and Davila had to settle for second place.
Four more events remain on the MSPT Venetian schedule starting with a $600 buy-in, $1,000,000 GTD tournament this weekend. That will be followed by Event #126: $5,000 NLHE $1M GTD June 15-17, Event #127: $1,600 NLHE $3M GTD June 18-22, and Event #128: $3,500 NLHE $3.5M GTD June 25-30.