Seminole Hard Rock Poker presents
Lucky Hearts Poker Open at Coconut Creek
$1,100 Deep Stack No Limit Hold’em
February 4-5, 2014

Entries: 78
Prize Pool: $78,000

Recap

The most prestigious event to date of the Lucky Hearts Poker Open featured a final table with nearly $6 million in career recorded live earnings between five players, while the other four finalists had only nine combined cashes before the start of the tournament.

In the end, the sharks defeated the fish as Seth Berger (Woodbury, NY) earned his first career title. Berger beat Vlad Varlashin (Krasnodar, Russia) heads up when his dodged 14 outs on the river against for the winning pair of 8s.

“I’m happy to get a win and get the monkey off my back,” said Berger who had a second and third place finish at the 2013 WSOP. “I’ve chopped before, but this is my first outright win.”

Berger earned $26,520 for the win, while Varlashin took home $15,522 as runner-up.

“I was hoping to win my first trophy,” said Varlashin, who spends his winters in Sunny Isles Beach, “For me it’s not about the money, I care much more about the trophy.”

Berger ($650,000+ in earnings) and Varlashin ($310,00) were joined at the table by fellow sharks Adam Levy ($2.1 million), Ryan D’Angelo ($1.5 million) and Joey Wiessman ($1 million), who has a WSOP bracelet on his resume.

The less experienced players put up a fight as Francisco Gomez (Lakeland) earned his first career cash with a third place finish ($10,140), while this was the second cash for Tomas Magni (6th).

“I held my own in a really sharky tournament,” said Mangi, “it’s a stacked final table.”

Day 2 began with the final nine already in the money. Levy (9th) was first to go out and was followed by Richard Kessler (8th), his fifth career cash, and Weissman (7th).

“It was a tough table,” said Berger, “but when Joey went out, I felt it was my tournament to lose.”

A pivotal hand for Berger came when he cracked D’Angelo’s pocket Aces with rivered trip Tens while holding KT. The hand knocked out D’Angelo in 4th place, one spot ahead of Jamar Lewis who earned his fifth cash.

Once Varlashin eliminated Gomez in third place, he had a slight chip lead heads up, which Berger overcame.

“Once I got the lead I picked up a lot of pots and got pretty aggressive,” said Berger.

“He’s better heads up,” said the complementary Varlashin, “he started to push me around.”

Berger is looking to continue his success in the WPT Seminole Hard Rock Lucky Hearts Poker Open Championship Event which kicks off Friday.

Final Table Results

Photo Gallery