ARTICLES BY: ALEXANDER KREYMER
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published over 2 years ago in
Card Player College Magazine Volume 1, Number 8
Card Player College Magazine Volume 1, Number 8
Turning Stone or Bust
NEW YORK UNIVERSITY - They call themselves "The Other Crew." At least once a month, Dan, Mikey, Max, Rob, Steve, and Daniel squeeze into a grey Nissan Pathfinder and drive four-and-a-half hours from their school, NYU, located in Manhattan, to Verona in upstate New York. They don't go for the great hiking trails and campsites during the summer nor the decent ski slopes during the winter. They go for the year-round overly air-conditioned poker room at the Turning Stone Resort & Casino.
Dan and Mikey, both completing their senior year at NYU, began this monthly tradition two years ago when they were still sophomores. Tired of playing online poker and small home games in their stuffy dormitory rooms, the two best friends ventured out into the world of green felt tables, professional dealers, and colorful chips marked with real denominations.
Being only 19 years old, Dan and Mikey experienced security problems playing at casinos in Atlantic City and Connecticut, where the minimum gambling age of 21 is enforced.
"Back then, we both had baby faces and patchy beards so we stuck out like sour thumbs," explains Dan. "Ten minutes at the table and security would ask to see some ID."
This left them with little choice. Either drive to upstate New York or stay in their dorm rooms playing home games and online poker. (Not that there's anything wrong with that.)
The two best friends and roommates made their first trip to Turning Stone Casino during the spring semester in 2004. They borrowed a car, a tiny 1997 Nissan Sentra, from Dan's uncle and left their campus early in the morning. They arrived at Turning Stone by noon on Friday, expecting to stay till Saturday afternoon. Their plans quickly changed as they turned $200 into $600 the first night. They played till 3 a.m. and woke up early the next morning to try to triple up again. The remainder of the weekend was a roller coaster filled with runner-runner flushes and bad-beat rivers. In the end, Dan and Mikey made a profit of $500 after paying for their hotel room, food, and gas. They left Turning Stone at 3:30 Sunday morning, trying to savor every last minute of their profitable trip. After driving till dawn and returning the car, Dan and Mikey ended up in their beds right before the start of their first morning class. Of course, they missed their classes and remained in bed for most of the day.
When school started the next year, Dan and Mikey had recruited four more friends to join them on their trips. "It felt like we were a mix between the MIT kids from Bringing Down the House and the gang from Ocean's Eleven," describes Dan. The group, now six strong, were ready to begin their attack on Turning Stone.
Bringing more people reduced their expenses per person since they split gas and hotel costs. With six people, they took shifts sleeping on the two beds in their room. Half of the group would go to sleep at midnight while the other half played all night long and got to bed by sunrise. With only two beds for three people, the guys used Roshambo (rock-paper-scissors) to decide who got stuck on the floor. Dan recalls that he was the luckiest when it came to playing for beds and never spent a night, or day, on the floor.
The next semester, Steve went abroad to London, leaving the group with an extra seat in the car. Promising Steve that he wouldn't be replaced, the group invited friends to join them occasionally. Twice they took Dan's friend from Columbia University and twice Daniel's younger brother who went to nearby Pace University. They managed to make seven trips that semester and made more than $3,000 combined. It was this semester that they got their team name from one of the dealers at Turning Stone.
"He noticed us coming every month or so and began to ask if we were all fraternity brothers or something. I told him about how we all drive up every few weeks from New York City and he began to call us The Other Crew," Dan explains. "The name sounded good and it stuck."
"They're really friendly but they don't understand why we would drive so long from Manhattan to play poker," Dan explains. "But it's more than just a drive for us. It's now a tradition."
Dan and Mikey, both completing their senior year at NYU, began this monthly tradition two years ago when they were still sophomores. Tired of playing online poker and small home games in their stuffy dormitory rooms, the two best friends ventured out into the world of green felt tables, professional dealers, and colorful chips marked with real denominations.
Being only 19 years old, Dan and Mikey experienced security problems playing at casinos in Atlantic City and Connecticut, where the minimum gambling age of 21 is enforced.
"Back then, we both had baby faces and patchy beards so we stuck out like sour thumbs," explains Dan. "Ten minutes at the table and security would ask to see some ID."
This left them with little choice. Either drive to upstate New York or stay in their dorm rooms playing home games and online poker. (Not that there's anything wrong with that.)
The two best friends and roommates made their first trip to Turning Stone Casino during the spring semester in 2004. They borrowed a car, a tiny 1997 Nissan Sentra, from Dan's uncle and left their campus early in the morning. They arrived at Turning Stone by noon on Friday, expecting to stay till Saturday afternoon. Their plans quickly changed as they turned $200 into $600 the first night. They played till 3 a.m. and woke up early the next morning to try to triple up again. The remainder of the weekend was a roller coaster filled with runner-runner flushes and bad-beat rivers. In the end, Dan and Mikey made a profit of $500 after paying for their hotel room, food, and gas. They left Turning Stone at 3:30 Sunday morning, trying to savor every last minute of their profitable trip. After driving till dawn and returning the car, Dan and Mikey ended up in their beds right before the start of their first morning class. Of course, they missed their classes and remained in bed for most of the day.
When school started the next year, Dan and Mikey had recruited four more friends to join them on their trips. "It felt like we were a mix between the MIT kids from Bringing Down the House and the gang from Ocean's Eleven," describes Dan. The group, now six strong, were ready to begin their attack on Turning Stone.
Bringing more people reduced their expenses per person since they split gas and hotel costs. With six people, they took shifts sleeping on the two beds in their room. Half of the group would go to sleep at midnight while the other half played all night long and got to bed by sunrise. With only two beds for three people, the guys used Roshambo (rock-paper-scissors) to decide who got stuck on the floor. Dan recalls that he was the luckiest when it came to playing for beds and never spent a night, or day, on the floor.
The next semester, Steve went abroad to London, leaving the group with an extra seat in the car. Promising Steve that he wouldn't be replaced, the group invited friends to join them occasionally. Twice they took Dan's friend from Columbia University and twice Daniel's younger brother who went to nearby Pace University. They managed to make seven trips that semester and made more than $3,000 combined. It was this semester that they got their team name from one of the dealers at Turning Stone.
"He noticed us coming every month or so and began to ask if we were all fraternity brothers or something. I told him about how we all drive up every few weeks from New York City and he began to call us The Other Crew," Dan explains. "The name sounded good and it stuck."
"They're really friendly but they don't understand why we would drive so long from Manhattan to play poker," Dan explains. "But it's more than just a drive for us. It's now a tradition."
