Dan KingDan Smith didn’t have to travel far to play in the 2014 World Series of Poker Main Event, as he resided in Las Vegas at the time. Smith ended Day 5 with 5,360,000 in chips, putting him in sixth place with 79 players remaining. He finished the 2014 WSOP Main Event in 20th place for $286,000.

The summer of 2014 had been kind to Smith, as prior to the Main Event, he found himself at two WSOP final tables. Smith finished in ninth place in a $1,500 No Limit Hold’em event and sixth place in a $5,000 No Limit Hold’em Eight-Handed event for approximately $29,000 and $96,000, respectively.

While Smith had considerable success at the Rio in 2014, his much bigger success leading up to the Main Event occurred in the $102,000 Super High Roller at the Bellagio, where he outlasted 66 players for a huge $2,000,000 cash. Smith also ran well in a smaller $10,200 High Roller Event, besting a small field of 13 players for almost $71,000.

This high roller specialist’s excellent summer catapulted his live tournament cashes to $8.3 million before his Main Event run.

One of the key hands for Smith in the Main Event came on Day 5 when he found himself battling it out with fellow American Kane Kalas. On a board of 9c-Qc-8h-Ah, Kalas put a stack of chips in the middle with Qs-9d. Smith pushed announced himself all-in with Qh-Qd, finding Kalas drawing dead.

If the duo did not get it all-in on the turn, they definitely would have on the river when the 9s gave Kalas a full house. Smith almost doubled his stack on this hand and ended with about 5.4 million in chips, which is near where he ended the day with.