The final table of the $40,000 Anniversary Event is set, thanks to a lightning fast playdown on day 3. After two consecutive days of play that went well into the morning hours, the final nine were already determined just after 9 p.m. on Saturday. It’s a good thing too, because those players are going to need all the rest they can get before they duke it out for the first-place prize of $1,891,012.
The day started predictably, with several of the short stacks busting within the first level. In fact, Andrew Robl, Frank Kassela, David Chiu and Neil Channing all went out in the first half hour of play.
It took 90 minutes before Andy Black was eliminated in 19th place, setting up the final two tables and many feared that the slow pace would continue as each elimination brought the field closer to the televised table of nine. Fortunately, the bustouts continued rapidly as Matthew Glantz, Clark Hamagami, Doshi Suresh, David Baker, and Brian Rast all hit the rail.
Throughout it all, Justin Bonomo had maintained his chip lead, but a huge pot went Alec Torelli’s way to send Brian Townsend out in 13th place. Townsend shoved for his last 800,000 on the button and Torelli isolated behind him all in. Noah Schwartz tanked in the big blind for a few minutes before making the call himself, putting a huge portion of his stack at risk.
Townsend showed 7
6
, Torelli showed pocket tens and Schwartz showed the best hand with pocket queens, but the board ran out J
10
7104 and Torelli’s quads bumped his stack to 5 million. Schwartz took a hit down to 700,000 and Townsend was eliminated from the tournament.
But the lead wasn’t safe for very long. After Matt Marafioti and Keith Lehr went out, the players returned from the dinner break with the task of eliminating just one more opponent. Torelli raised to 155,000 and Isaac Haxton called. The flop came out Q86 and Torelli checked. Haxton bet 400,000 and Torelli moved all in after some thought. Haxton instantly called and showed 66 for bottom set. Torelli showed QJ and was drawing very thin to take out Haxton.
The turn and river came 103 and Haxton doubled up to 5,520,000. Torelli lost about half of his stack and was forced to hit the brakes for a bit until Antanas Guoga went out on the final table bubble.
Here are the final nine and their chip counts:
Seat 1 — Ted Forrest — 560,000
Seat 2 — Noah Schwartz — 660,000
Seat 3 — Alec Torelli — 2,340,000
Seat 4 — Isaac Haxton — 5,955,000
Seat 5 — Greg Raymer — 3,345,000
Seat 6 — Justin Bonomo — 1,685,000
Seat 7 — Lex Veldhuis — 3,805,000
Seat 8 — Dani Stern — 1,300,000
Seat 9 — Vitaly Lunkin — 4,565,000
