Brian "Bear" McCann, a full-time player who's been having a thin time of it lately, finally came out of hibernation to win the 10th event of Winnin' o' the Green, $200 no-limit hold'em. Starting with the second-lowest chip stack at the final table, aggressive play made him the co-leader when he got heads-up with Michel Halioua, another pro. But he had to slow down against Mike's relentless raising, fell well behind in the course of a grueling 34-hand battle, and then pulled off two big draw-outs to surge to victory.
With 10 players, Avner Levy, holding A-J, moved in for more than $30,000 on a J-3-2 flop. Anthony Tran called with pocket 8s, and hit a set on the river. "I can't believe you called with that (f-word) hand, Levy blurted. The good news: he didn't have to serve out a 10-minute penalty. The bad news: it was because he had been knocked out.
That gave Anthony a big chip lead of $87,400 when the final table assembled. Antes were $300 with blinds of $1,000-$2,000. On the second hand, Xiaoen Wang, a scientist, moved all in for $6,200 with A-9 of clubs. Neil Ho called with pocket kings. Then Tom Honkawa moved in for his $12,500 with J-J, and Neil gladly called. It was high drama as Ho flopped a set, Wang outran him with a flush on fourth, and then a paired queen filled Ho and left two seats vacant.
After blinds went to $2,000-$4,000 with $500 antes, Anthony lost $26,000 when he raised to $12,000 with 8-5 of hearts and Mike moved in for an additional $14,000 with A-K and flopped a king. Anthony got playful a few hands later. When Brian moved in for $31,500 more, Anthony asked for a chip count just to make him sweat, then folded his 4-2. “Any Right Guard?” Brian asked.
On hand 17, Kathy Liebert, who hadn’t played a hand, dropping from $21,900 to $6,500, found pocket 8s and moved in. Mike called with K-10 and broke her with a river 10. A couple of hands later, Paul Lui tried an all-in raise for $2,500 more with just 9-2. Dan Heimiller, in the small blind with 8-4 of spades, called for the few more chips and flushed, leaving Paul in sixth place.
On hand 27, Anthony raised the pot $12,000 and Mike re-raised to put him in. Anthony had A-5 and Mike had A-7. With a board of 3-8-9-10, it looked like the pot might be chopped, but a river 6 gave Mike a straight, and Anthony was chopped. Three hands later, Heimiller raised all in with A-10 and found himself up against Brian’s J-J. Brian flopped a set, and the field was trimmed to three.
At this point, McCann led with over $100,000 with his two opponents in the $75,000 range. With blinds of $3,000-$6,000 and $1,000 antes, Brian began gathering more chips with a drumbeat of uncalled raises and all-in moves. “You raise every hand, huh?” Ho asked. “Just doing my job,” McCann replied. Ho, with K-10 finally called one of McCann’s raises, caught him with just 10-9, and relieved him of close to $40,000. Mike later moved in with 10-7 of clubs. Ho called with A-8 of clubs, but lost and was left $22,000 when the board came Q-4-2-10-6. Brian took that away from him on the next hand when his pocket jacks held up against Ho’s J-8.
It was now heads-up, with McCann and Halioua just about dead even.
As the battle raged, Mike pulled into a substantial lead. Then, with $5,000-$10,000 blinds and $1,000 antes, Brian began playing catch-up with his first big draw-out. He had 9-7 versus K-7 and hit a 9 on the turn to make 9s and 7s. He then cut Mike down to about $30,000 when his A-9 won against Mike’s A-7. Finally, on the last hand, Mike was all in with K-2 against Brian’s J-5, but two more 5s on the flop spelled the end. –Max Shapiro
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