The Winner’s Circle takes a look at the biggest wins from the tournament trail by the players who made it happen. This series will look at the big hands, toughest opponents, and paths to victory each player took in their most recent tournament win through their own eyes and words. If you ever wanted to know what it takes to win a major poker tournament, this is a good place to start.
The winner featured in this week’s edition needs little introduction, as everyone in the poker world is well aware that Huck Seed just took home the 2009 NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship title. Seed defeated Vanessa Rousso 2-0 in the final and he became the most consistent player in NBC Heads-Up history after the win with a record of 18-4.
Card Player caught up with Seed after the win at the post final table press conference.
Card Player: You seemed to control the final match the whole time. Was your prior experience a factor?
Huck Seed: Yeah, I kind of felt one step ahead, and I was getting really good reads on where she was at and what she was doing.
CP: Would you agree there was a lot of min-raising taking place in the final?
HS: Yeah, she min-raised the button a lot, and I never reraised her until kind of a key moment or two when I felt like she was pretty weak. I reraised her big with a 5-2 offsuit and a K-3 offsuit, and I made some nice money that way just by waiting.
CP: You have a ton of prior success in this event; you won a $5,000 heads-up event in Canada last year, and now this. Do you think that you’re one of the best heads-up players in the world?
HS: No, not really, but you know I enjoy these tournaments, and I’ve had a couple of nice runs in them.
CP: Do you think the structure here is more about skill, or is there a lot of luck?
HS: I think there is a lot of skill; obviously not as much skill as if you played somebody heads up all day for a week, or the Durrrr Challenge, which is 50,000 hands of heads up or whatever, obviously that’s an insane amount of skill. It’s live poker here, you can see the person, there’s a lot of skill in each hand, and you play a lot of hands, so I do think there is a significant amount of skill involved.
CP: You seem pretty tired right now after the long road to the win, but are you still excited?
HS: In the match against Sammy [Farha], I was low on energy and I was getting frustrated and stiff in my chair. I got up pretty early, and what time is it? I went to bed last night at 9:30 p.m., so I’m up past my bedtime today.
CP: What was your confidence level like heading into this year’s event?
HS: It was kind of low, actually…maybe because I’ve been losing; I haven’t been playing that well lately. It was a little low, and then I won my first couple of matches and I had it back.
CP: Who was your toughest opponent in the event?
HS: Sammy was the toughest match; he was the only guy who I thought was on top of me at times. In my match with David Oppenheim, he brought a really strong presence to the table, but our match was so short. We played a coin-flip early, and I thought that was going to be a tough match.
CP: What did you think about all of the all-in pots that took place between you and Farha in the Final Four?
HS: The blinds got really high, and he almost had the match won. I was down to nothing, so I really got lucky from that point. He had me dead in the match and held a 10-to-1 chip lead. I feel like, up to that point, he did outplay me, but then once I got a little lucky and got back to even, there wasn’t much play left. I think I did outplay him a little. A couple of times he limped, and I thought he was weak and I moved in with nothing and he folded.
CP: What does it mean to be the most consistent player in the history of this event?
HS: I’m real happy with my play; I played really well in the last match and some of the early matches. I was really happy with the consistency of my play, and I had a lot of fun playing. It was a wonderful tournament. I really enjoyed it.
CP: Tell me a little bit about the final match and your opponent Vanessa Rousso.
HS: She’s a real gentlewoman, a good-hearted player. She enjoys the game a lot, and she was really into it. She played hard, and she fought hard, so it was an intense match. I was really happy with my play, and I was lucky enough to pull it off in the first two matches with no need to go to a tie-breaker match.
CP: Once you had the 1-0 lead, did you start gambling more to grab the win?
HS: Definitely not; I was definitely playing my best, and I was trying to get a lead before the blinds got too big so that there wouldn’t be any gambling involved. I didn’t want to gamble and give her a chance to get lucky and then force a tie-breaker match.
