WSOP: Mohsin Charania Completes Triple Crown with $1,500 NLHE Win
Two more players earned their first World Series of Poker bracelet on Thursday with one player finally completing live poker’s version of the Triple Crown and another player winning an event in a game he just doesn’t play that often. The second-to-last $10,000 Championship event before the Main Event moved on to Day 3 as did the $1,500 Seven Card Stud event.
Mohsin Charania Defeats Cary Katz to win $1,500 NLHE and Lock Up Triple Crown
Coming into the 2017 WSOP, Mohsin Charania was one of just a few players who had a shot at completing live poker’s version of the Triple Crown: a World Poker Tour title, a European Poker Tour title and WSOP bracelet. Charania had two WPT wins (2013 & 2014) and won the Season 8 EPT Grand Final in 2012. Thursday night he rode a roller coaster of a final table to take home his first WSOP bracelet.
At the start of the day Charania had the fifth biggest chip stack, but found himself swinging up and down the chip counts as the day progressed.
“I kind of felt, maybe a little bit of pressure coming into the day because I had a lot of chips,” said Charania. “And then the day just didn’t work out for me in the beginning, so I was like seven of 10. It was really kind of a straightforward final table. I didn’t get into any crazy spots, so I didn’t have to make any massive decisions, so I never felt like any intense pressure.”
Charania eventually found himself heads-up with Cary Katz with a nearly 3-1 chip lead and it took him only 30 minutes to finish off Katz to win his first career bracelet.
“This is pretty damn awesome,” said Charania.
Charania had a large and loud rail at the Rio cheering him on, but the 32-year-old from Chicago still managed to maintain his focus.
“This happens when I’m just playing online on Tuesday, so I’m used to it. Wait until you see me get deep in like a $109 [online]. It’s just chaos,” said Charania. “No, you get used to it and you learn to block it out and you know like you’re kind of excited because you know that when you win a pot, everyone is going to cheer for you, so it’s kind of nice.”
Katz, who made his fortune in the student loan business and now owns PokerCentral and PokerGO, earned $225,181 for his runner-up performance. It’s the second time he’s finished runner-up in a WSOP event. In 2013 he finished second to Davidi Kitai in a $5,000 Pot Limit Hold’em event.
Ian Steinman, the #4-ranked online poker player in Nevada, finished seventh for $48,276. He actually had the chip lead with seven players remaining but lost a series of pots including the last one which saw him racing with 
against Brandon Ageloff’s 
. The 
was a disaster for Steinman and when the turn did not produce an ace, he was out in seventh place. The five-figure score was by far the largest live score for the online pro. His previous best WSOP cash was for $5,199.
Final Table Payouts
- Mohsin Charania – $364,438
- Cary Katz – $225,181
- Brandon Ageloff – $161,844
- Andy Frankenberger – $117,611
- Mikhail Rudoy – $86,424
- Samuel Phillips – $64,226
- Ian Steinman – $48,276
- Yanki Koppel – $36,708
- Milan Simko – $28,239
No Limit Specialist Max Silver Wins $3,000 Six Max Limit Hold’em
Max Silver has 25 career WSOP cashes and 21 of them are in No Limit Hold’em – seven of which came last summer. On Thursday, the British pro won his first WSOP bracelet, but it wasn’t in the game he specializes in, it was a Limit Hold’em bracelet.
Silver beat San Francisco’s Guowei Zhang to win the $3,000 Six Max Limit Hold’em event and $172,645. It’s the British pros third cash of the 2017 WSOP, with the previous two coming in NLHE.
“I’ve had several nice scores, but this, this is just amazing,” said Silver after his win.
Zhang’s runner-up payday of $106,694 was the largest score of his career.
Silver had the chip lead throughout the final table and eliminated only two of his final five opponents. Afterwards Silver, who developed the SnapShove app to help No Limit players, joked about the future of his product.
I won!!!! Bracelet and $172k in the $3000 6 max LIMIT Holdem. @SnapShove limit holdem module coming Q4 2017. pic.twitter.com/8UjREydMLI
— Max Silver (@max_silver) June 30, 2017
Final Table Payouts
- Max Silver – $172,645
- Guowei Zhang – $106,694
- Mickey Craft – $69,789
- Ayman Qutami – $46,871
- Lena Wang – $32,345
- Georgios Kapalas – $22,952
Scott Clements Leads $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha Championship
There was a time where Scott Clements was considered one of the best Omaha tournament players on the planet. That may still be the case after the two-time WSOP bracelet winner stormed to the chip lead on Day 2 of the $10,000 Eight-handed Pot Limit Omaha Championship with just 39 players remaining.
Clements bagged up 1,700,000 and now holds a commanding lead over the rest of the field heading into what is scheduled to be the final day of play. Michail Karapanos sits second with 1,133,000 while Ben Lamb and Ryan Miller each ave 1,090,000 and 1,011,000 respectively as the only players with seven-figure stacks. Recent bracelet winner John Racener rounds out the top five with 987,000.
Other notables still in the field include Johnny Lodden (672,000), Jason DeWitt (657,000), eoghan O’Dea (376,000), John Monnette (246,000) and Mike Gorodinsky (228,000).
There were 26 players who managed to finish in the money before busting on Thursday night including Toby Lewis (64th – $14,930), Ian O’Hara (59th – $14,930), Stephen Chidwick (52nd – $15,934) and defending champion Brandon Shack-Harris (45th – $17,420).
Action resumes at Noon PT on Friday.
Top 10 Chip Counts
- Scott Clements – 1,700,000
- Michail Karapanos – 1,133,000
- Ben Lamb – 1,090,000
- Ryan Miller – 1,011,000
- John Racener – 987,000
- Cyrus Partow – 931,000
- Chris Lee – 803,000
- Aleksei Altshuller – 794,000
- Sean Rafael – 792,000
- Howard Millian – 708,000
Tsong Lin Heads $1,500 Seven Card Stud Final Table
Tsong Lin has just two career cashes to his name, but on Friday afternoon he’ll have a shot at winning his first career WSOP bracelet after bagging up the Day 2 chip lead in the $1,500 Seven Card Stud event. Lin finished play Thursday with 791,000.
Yueqi Zhu, who has already cashed five other times this summer, ended with the second largest stack, 512,000. This is Zhu’s 10th career WSOP final table and second this summer. Last year he finished runner-up to Lawrence Berg in the $1,500 Dealer’s Choice event.
The final table gets underway at 2 PM PT.
Final Table Chip Counts
- Tsong Lin – 791,000
- Yueqi Zhu – 512,000
- Cheryl Denzik – 304,000
- Alexander Freund – 206,000
- Daniel Mogavero – 163,000
- Tom Koral – 147,000
- Todd Bui – 113,000
Nacho Barbero On Top After Day 1 of $5,000 No-Limit Hold’em
The final $5,000 No Limit Hold’em got underway on Thursday with the 623 players who entered also making it the largest. Just 247 players survived Day 1 with Nacho Barbero of Argentina ending Day 1 with the lead. Barbero finished with 230,300 to put him just ahead of David Coleman’s 205,200.
Juha Helppi also managed to finish with a top five stack after putting 193,200 into his bag at the end of the night. Other notables moving on to Day 2 include Matt Berkey, Michael Mizrachi, Olivier Busquet, Jason Mercier, Mike Watson, Kevin Stammen, Nick Schulman, Jonathan Little, Ari Engel, Calvin Anderson and Pratyush Buddiga.
Day 2 begins at Noon PT.
Top 10 Chip Counts
- Nacho Barbero – 230,300
- David Coleman – 205,200
- Carlos Chang – 197,600
- Juha Helppi – 193,200
- Donis Agnelli – 184,600
- Pete Chen – 170,000
- Matt Berkey – 165,500
- Raymond Langbraaten – 158,700
- Julian Stuer – 157,600
- Michael Mizrachi – 148,900
$2,500 Omaha/Stud Hi-Lo 8 or Better Draws 405 Entries
Larry Tull navigated his way to the top of the Day 1 chip counts in the $2,500 Omaha/Stud Hi-Lo event with just 126 of the original 405 players moving on to Day 2.
Tull finished with 152,200 while his closest competitor, David Matsumoto, had 124,900 after completing 10 levels of play. Igor Sharaskin, who has already cashed in four Omaha events this summer, finished with 112,600, good enough for third.
Action resumes at 2 PM PT.
Top 10 Chip Counts
- Larry Tull – 152,500
- David Matsumoto – 124,900
- Igor Sharaskin – 112,600
- Jeremiah Callahan – 95,400
- Alex Luneau – 94,000
- Daniel Ratigan – 90,100
- Josh Arieh – 84,200
- Manuel Labandeira – 83,500
- Yuebin Guo – 74,100
- Matthew Mortensen – 73,500
