The 2017 Spring Championship of Online Poker kicked off on Sunday with a handful of tournaments finishing out on Monday. There are six opening events (times three different price points) playing down to a winner and Event 3 saw players making some serious money long before they hit the payout portion of the tournament. After nearly 20 hours of online grinding, u3meha beat 2013 PCA Main Event champ Dimitar “KuuL” Danchev heads up for his first COOP title.
Event 3-H had players put $1,000 into the regular prize pool and another $1,000 in the form of a bounty on each player. And not just any bounty, but a Progressive Knockout bounty that saw the price on each player’s head increase even as they put more money in their bankroll.
The tournament drew a nice, even 700 players to create a nice, even $1.4 million prize pool. They piled $700,000 into the regular prize pool and another $700,000 in bounties. The last 90 players split up the regular prize pool and there were still 53 players around when they paused the action for the evening.
As far as making some money before that point, merla888 takes the unique unofficial honor of making the most money without out actually making it into the money. The Belgian finished in 146th place, well away from the final 90, but put $6,125 in their bankroll via knockout bounties. That’s nearly as good as if marla888 made it all the way down to the last two tables in the tournament.
v0vapr0 was the overnight leader and was also the top player on the bounty list until the tournament wrapped up. They collected $23,562 in bounty money, better than seventh place money, but dropped out in 24th place. GMAERBOYAA was the recipient of v0vapr0’s bounty and that pushed their count to more than $17,000.
Event 3 turned into a snowball of increasing bounty amounts. Progressive.
There were no members of Team PokerStars in the money but Lex Veldhuis made a valiant effort to get there. The Dutch pro finished in 106th place but picked up a $3,000 rebate in bounty money.
Two interesting stories popped up as the tournament approached the final table bubble. Dimitar “KuuL” Danchev and elmerixx had some history in common, but not at the same time.
When WCOOP 2014 rolled around, Danchev was already a known quantity after walking away from the Bahamas with the 2013 PCA Main Event crown. He entered the $10,300 WCOOP 2014 High Roller and went all the way to the final table for a seventh place finish.
One year later, elmerixx enter the exact same tournament during WCOOP 2015, made it to the final table and coincidentally crashed out of that tournament in seventh place as well.
Another interesting side note was the success of disquesi! and andersbisse. Both players already booked Sunday major online titles, both in the Sunday Super-Sized tournament. The interesting part is the Sunday Super-Sized event is also a Progressive Knockout tournament just like this tournament, with disquesi! picking up their win back in February.
Unfortunately for andersbisse, they found themselves mixed up in a big hand with 11 players remaining and nine making the final table. Chip leader DawgKillah opened for a min-raise under the gun, then saw goodeh99 and andersbisse move all in. andersbisse was in good shape for a triple up with J♣ J♦ versus the 10♥ 10♠of DawgKillah and A♠Q♦ of goodeh99.
The K♣ 6♠5♠flop was harmless before goodeh99 took their turn in the lead on the A♥ turn. DawgKillah had two outs for the double knockout and binked it on the 10♦ river to pick up more than $6,000 in bounties while allowing the tournament to avoid the pesky hand-for-hand business on the final table bubble.
Besides Danchev, elmerixx, and disquesi! there were some other talented players booking their seat in the opening weekend final table. Rui “RuiNF” Ferreira was perhaps the most recognizable username when they joined as one. The multiple-COOP champ picked up a SCOOP Heads Up title in 2014 and added a WCOOP 2015 in the $215 Big Antes event.
MITS 304 had a chance to move one step closer to Triple COOP honors and a win here would add nicely to the $1,000 WCOOP Razz Championship from this past September. scrubbyz has two Sunday major victories, Sunday 500 from 2012 and Sunday Supersonic in 2015, and could add a really big Sunday tournament with a SCOOP win.
Seat 1: scrubbyz (818,648 in chips, $9,839.84 bounty)
Seat 2: MITS 304 (739,739 in chips, $3,875 bounty)
Seat 3: disquesi! (1,378,276 in chips, $10,125 bounty)
Seat 4: DawgKillah (5,300,326 in chips, $19,335.93 bounty)
Seat 5: Rui “RuiNF” Ferreira (1,753,030 in chips, $15,999.99 bounty)
Seat 6: upspokerbad (772,354 in chips, $10,812.50 bounty)
Seat 7: Dimitar “KuuL” Danchev (1,156,828 in chips, $16,664.06 bounty)
Seat 8: elmerixx (1,070,459 in chips, $9,218.75 bounty)
Seat 9: u3meha (1,010,340 in chips, $5,437.50 bounty)
Blinds: 8,000/16,000 with a 2,000 ante
One and done for elmerixx
For all the words about elmerixx’ success, they came to the final table with the second shortest stack and wasted zero time getting those virtual chips into the middle.
On the first hand together, elmerixx called a min-raise open from Danchev then four-bet shoved after a three-bet from disquesi!. And it was an easy call for disquesi! with A♥ A♦ . elmerixx needed a lot of work to stay in the game but never found a sweat on the J♦ 5♠3♠K♦ 7♣ board to exit in ninth place.
One hand, one knockout. Progressive.
Super bad flop for upspokerbad
One orbit later and our short stack was the next one at risk and it was not pretty. upspokerbad was all in from the button with disquesi! trying to do the heavy lifting for the table. Not a completely selfless act with the big bounties.
The hand started out as a race with upspokerbad’s A♦ Kâ™ against 9♣ 9♥ but the race turned out to be like Usain Bolt against a toddler. Along with an ace, there were also two nines on the Aâ™ 9â™ 9♦ flop. upspokerbad had one tenth of one percent chance to go runner-runner with the last two aces but the 3♣ turn left him drawing dead to eighth place.
Cruel DawgKillah flop no good for MITS 304
The final table stacks continued to sit in the stratosphere, with the average running over 83 big blinds with seven players remaining, so it took two big starting hands to put someone at risk.
MITS 304 needed to pick up some chips if they wanted to add a SCOOP to their WCOOP and called all in at risk when chip leader DawnKillah shipped in from the big blind. It was a quick, easy call for MITS 304 with Q♦ Q♥ and was in great shape against DawgKillah’s JackAce over card A♣ J♦ .
Right up until the unkind A♠10♦ 5♦ flop. The 10♥ turn was of no consequence and MITS 304 fell short of a second COOP after the J♥ river to exit in seventh place.
Danchev moves into the lead, ships Ferreira out
Former PCA Main Event champ Danchev sat back to let DawgKillah push most of the action and do most of the talking. That was working out well before DawgKillah four-bet shoved with a baby pair straight into a premium. DawgKillah’s 2♥ 2♦ didn’t look that hot up against A♥ Aâ™ and Danchev took the lead when his aces held.
A few hands later, Ferreira moved all in with A♣ Q♣ and Danchev called to put him at risk with 9♥ 9♦ . Ferreira missed the flop but added a gutshot on the K♦ J♠2♥ board then blanked the 7♥ turn and 2♠river to exit in fourth place.
Danchev rockets again
Two hands after Ferreira was sent out, former big chip leader DawgKillah made a move that ran into trouble. u3meha released his button hand and DawgKillah moved all in with a suited ace.
Unfortunately for DawgKillah, Danchev was sitting there in the big blind with aces once again. DawgKillah was dominated with A♦ 5♦ against A♥ A♣ and blanked the entire board to take his $26,000 in bounties with him in third place.
u3meha defeats Danchev for SCOOP title
Seat 7: Dimitar “KuuL” Danchev (8,226,100 in chips, $37,760.72 bounty)
Seat 9: u3meha (5,773,900 in chips, $15,507.81 bounty)
Danchev began heads-up play with a nice lead but it did not last long. u3meha quickly swapped stack sizes in a 7 million chip pot that saw neither player get all in and Danchev was never able to recover.
His stack continued to dip and called eventually called all in for his stack with a big-ish ace after u3meha open/shoved from the button. Danchev was ahead with A♥ 10♥ but had to dodge the two live cards of u3meha with 8♦ 7♣ . The J♠6♠4♠flop was clean for Danchev, the 9♣ turn left him with 13 outs to dodge on the river, but the 7♠river finished up the tournament when it paired up u3meha.
Danchev missed out on an opportunity to add an online major title to his PCA Main Event win but can be comforted by the $140,000 he earned between both prize pools. u3meha takes home their first major tournament victory joining a talented group of players with a COOP title plus $165,000 in a boost.
SCOOP-03-H ($2,100 NLHE Progressive KO) results
Entrants: 700
Total prize pool: $700,000
Bounty prize pool: $700,000
Places paid: 90
1. u3meha (Ukraine) $131,250 + $34,388.17 in bounties
2. Dimitar “KuuL” Danchev (Bulgaria) $94,500 + $37,760.72 in bounties
3. DawgKillah (Serbia) $70,000 + $26,193.35 in bounties
4. Rui “RuiNF” Ferreira (Netherlands) $52,500 + $15,999.99 in bounties
5. disquesi! (Slovakia) $36,750 + $20,140.62
6. scrubbyz (Canada) $29,750 + $9,839.84 in bounties
7. MITS 304 (Cyprus) $22,750 + $3,875 in bounties
8. upspokerbad (United Kingdom) $15,750 + $10,812.50 in bounties
9. elmerixx (Finland) $9,870 + $9,218.75 in bounties
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