Home / Poker News January 2009 / Mark Kassis wins AM $1,150 NL Holdem event with rebuys
Mark Kassis wins AM $1,150 NL Holdem event with rebuys
Posted by: James Carter. - Mon, 2009-01-19 16:45
Many of the players present at the Aussie Millions’ $1,150 NL holdem event (event #6) final table came from the online circuit. Tony Dunst, Rayan Nathan, Sorel Mizzi, Jonathan Karamalikis, and Richard Ashby were all established online professionals. At the end of the day however, the champion’s ring would find its final destination on local player, Mark Kassis’ finger, who walked away with the AU$160,326 first prize.
Jonathan Kramalikis held the chip lead heading into the final stretch with 153,000 chips, while Rayan Nathan was the short-stack with 38,700.
Tony Dunst’s final table is probably something he’ll remember for a long time to come, and it won’t be on account of how well things went for him. After getting stuck in traffic and missing the first orbit, he failed to get any sort of traction at all. The herald of his early demise was a big pot he lost to Larry Karambis, having rammed his K,K into the latter’s pocket rockets.
Peter Rho attempted to pull a fast one on Sorel Mizzi next, be he obviously chose the wrong player to mess about with. He pot committed himself trying to steal the blinds, and Mizzi shoved all-in on him. Left with no choice, Rho shoved the last of his chips in too, and although it did hit a 4 card flush on the turn, his Qd,10d failed to beat Mizzi’s A,J.
Richard Ashby finished 7th, eliminated by Clark Hamagami’s A.K.
Next, Hamagami successfully drove home his pocket jacks against Larry Karambis’ pocket 7s in a hand which resulted in the latter’s elimination.
With 3 players left in contention, the game continued on for a while, until Kramalikis and Hamagami got into a decisive tangle which resulted in Hamagami’s elimination. He picked up $82,203 for his efforts.
As a result of the aforementioned hand, Karamalikis took a hefty chip-lead heading into the heads up. With Kassis reluctant to call it the day though, the game went through wild swings before leaving Karamalikis on a very short stack.
Unfortunately for him, the hand on which he decided to shove it all in was the one in which Kassis had picked up a pair of Qs. Karamalikis’ 2,3 did catch a pair on the flop, but it didn’t improve any further.
