Daniel Colpoys wins PokerGO Cup Opener for $200,000

Image courtesy of PokerGO.com

Daniel Colpoys bagged the opening event of the 2022 PokerGO Cup last night, pocketing $200,200 and taking an early lead in the overall race won by Daniel Negreanu last year...

The first of eight events at the PokerGO Studio at ARIA Resort & Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, was a $10k buy-in affair, with 77 entries including Ali Imsirovic, Alex Foxen, Bryn Kenney, Stephen Chidwick and reigning champion, Daniel Negreanu.

None of those poker luminaries would make it to the 11 paid spots, though, the money bubble burst by a typical race, won by Darren Elias...

Elias: 5♣ 5♠
Halverson: A♠ K♦

Flop: Q♣ J♣ 6♦
Turn: 2♦
River: 7♦

♥ ♦ ♣ ♠

Day one of the two-day tournament ended when Shannon Shorr ran his pocket nines into Colpoys’ jacks, commenting, “Fish Hooks again” -having previously run his big slick into Colpys’ jacks – and the board bricked again, Shorr exiting in 7th spot.

Back for day two, and it was Andrew Lichtenberger who came in with a huge lead, Elias with the shortest stack, but it was Colpoys’ pocket jacks that once again held up, KOing Michael Lang in 6th spot.

Elias took care of Scott Ball in 5th spot, then Colpoys sent both Matthew Wantman and Elias to the rail, leaving himself heads-up against Lichtenberger.

A slow and tense affair was eventually lit up by the following, final, hand of the event...

Colpoys: 9♥ 9♦
Lichtenberger: A♣ 4♣

Lichtenberger’s button limp and subsequent call brought a nothing flop...

Flop: 3♣ 5♦ Q♥

A small Colpoys bet led them to the turn, and this is where things got interesting...

Turn: A♦

Lichtenberger fired out a ¼ pot bet, with Colpoys making the call, finding it hard to put his opponent, known as “LuckyChewy”, on an ace...

River: 9♣

A clever check on the river gave Lichtenberger just enough rope to hang himself, his all-in snapped off by Colpoys for the victory.

Final table results

Colpys, who had almost equalled his previous best tournament score, told PokerGO reporters afterwards: “I was kind of handcuffed at the start, and then I got some momentum and ran pretty well. I’m happy to take it down. I respect a lot of the guys there. It was nice.”

Event 2 of the 8-tournament PokerGO Cup Series sees Scott Ball bring the chip lead into today’s final table, with Darren Elias in the mix again, and Bryn Kenney, Dan Shak, Cary Katz and Sean Perry rounding out the final six.

We’ll bring you all the best of the action in our winner’s report tomorrow, so be sure to check back in!