On Sunday, only 63 players returned for Day 2 action, and after roughly 12 hours of play, it was Nick Barksdale coming out on top to win the $120,072 top prize and his third MSPT title!
“It’s pretty surreal,” Barksdale said after his victory, “I really don’t get to play much tournaments so I really try and make it to the local stops that I can drive to.”
Barksdale continued, “So I had a decision to make a decision Saturday morning on if I was going to make the drive down or not cause it’s still a jog as it's like a five-hour drive, but my wife and I made the decision to come down and I’m glad she was able to come with.”
The decision was the correct one for Barksdale, as he came into the day holding just outside the top ten and had a rollercoaster ride throughout it which eventually led to him taking the top stack into the final table.
“I was fortunate to run really good against tough opponents at the final table and I want to say congrats to Wayne (Tweeton) he was a really tough opponent in the heads-up match that could have gone either way and I’m just fortunate to have come out on top,”
The victory was an impressive feat for Barksdale who was able to capture his third title almost a year to the date after winning his second one here last November taking his career MSPT earnings up to $427,624.
The final day came back with 63 players already in the money, so action kicked right into gear with short stack Logan Hatch being the first elimination of the day falling to Brett “Pops” Reichard.
Hatch’s elimination sparked a fire as all players started to make their way to the payout desk with Trey Bartlett, Dan Hamm, Jason Gross, and MSPT Hall of Famer Umut Ozturk all falling in the first batch of eliminations.
The rush of players to the payout line continued with MSPT champs Jake Wilding (42nd Place - $2,459), Angela Jordison (37th Place - $2,459), Josh Reichard (34th Place - $2,744), Carl Carodenuto (30th Place - $2,744), and Curtis Vierstraete (29th Place - $2,477) all had their final day cut much shorter than anticipated while fellow champs Mo Nuwwarah (19th Place - $5,032), and Chris Audrain (13th Place - $6,861) just missed out on the final table.
Final Table Action
The final table saw a bunch of familiar faces at it, one of which was Loren Rice who was looking to improve off of his fourth place finish here from earlier this year, and he got off to a hot start after he set up MSPT top casher DJ Buckley in ninth place.
Unfortunately for Rice, his final table run came to an abrupt end soon after he failed to win a race holding a made hand of nines against Nathan Masingill’s Big Slick.
Another familiar face at the final table was defending champ Phirom Peterschmidt whose title defense came up short after his made hand of deuces failed to crack John McVoy’s pair of jacks.
After Peterschmidt’s departure, fellow Riverside champ Nick Barksdale went on a heater claiming the likes of Masingill, MSPT Hall of Famer Rich Alsup and McVoy all in quick succession in hopes of securing a third title.
With three players remaining, Barksdale held half of the chips in play but ended up losing the lead to Tweeton after he tripped up Andy Rogowski in third place for $53,746.
From there, Tweeton held a significant chip advantage over Barksdale, but he wasn’t able to hold it as Barksdale was able to away until the final hand where he was able to hoist his third MSPT trophy and payday good for $120,072 while Tweeton finished runner-up for $73,754
This wraps up our coverage for this event but Season 15 of the MSPT continues as we head to Parkwest Bicycle Casino in Los Angeles, California from next (November 5th - 10th) and our reporting team will be on hand providing updates for the $500K GTD $1,110 Main Event so make sure to come back!