Event 3: Phil Hui Loses His Lead, Drops to a Single Chip to Battle for Survival Against Short-Stacked Matt Axelrod

$400 H.O.R.S.E. (Re-Entry)
Structure | Payouts
Level 19:  10,000/20,000 Limits
Players Remaining:  9 of 88

Phil Hui
Phil Hui

Matt Axelrod has been steadily blinding down as the short stack, while Phil Hui has been losing some pots to lose his lead and steadily drop at a quicker pace.

Axelrod was down to just a few chips when Hui played the final hand of the Razz round to showdown against Brandon Caputo and lost. That left Hui as the short stack with just a single 1K chip — the smallest denomination in play.

Hui was forced all in on the next hand for the ante (in the first hand of a Stud round), and Axelrod had just enough chips to fold and play at least one more hand. Caputo isolated Hui, and here’s what they held in Stud:

Brandon Caputo:  (10c5s) Ad
Phil Hui:  (2s2c) Kc

Hui started out with the lead, but could he hold it to stay alive? These were their final hands:

Brandon Caputo:  (10c5s) Ad3cQd7d (10h)
Phil Hui:  (2s2c) Kc6c8d2h (9d)

Hui hit a set of deuces on sixth street, and Caputo was drawing dead. Hui won that pot to survive.

Phil Hui  –  9,000  (0.5 BB)
Brandon Caputo  –  385,000  (24 BB)

Matt Axelrod
Matt Axelrod

The next hand (second hand of Stud), Matt Axelrod was left with 1K after paying the ante, and he moved all in showing the 7c. It ended up being a multi-way pot, with 22K available for Axelrod to win in the main pot. Everyone checked third street to see a free card:

Lucas Poelker:  (XxXx) AhKs
Miami John Cernuto:  (XxXx) 2h5c
Matt Axelrod:  (XxXx) 7cQs
Brandon Caputo:  (XxXx) Ac3d

Poelker bets his ace-king, and Cernuto and Caputo both folded for Poelker to win the side pot. Axelrod and Poelker turned over their cards, and the dealer dealt out the rest of the hand for the main pot:

Lucas Poelker:  (10s10c) AhKs6s9c (Qd)
Matt Axelrod:  (7h3c) 7cQsKdJh (7d)

Poelker’s pair of tens was ahead of Axelrod’s pair of sevens, until Axelrod spiked trip sevens on seventh street to win the pot and get up to 22K.

That was the last hand of Level 18, and the players took a 15-minute break. These were the official chip counts at that point:

Seat 1.  Lucas Poelker  –  97,000  (5 BB)
Seat 2.  Miami John Cernuto  –  72,000  (4 BB)
Seat 3.  Matt Vinke  –  200,000  (10 BB)
Seat 4.  Matt Axelrod  –  22,000  (1 BB)
Seat 5.  Brandon Caputo  –  379,000  (19 BB)
Seat 6.  Wayne Brown  –  82,000  (4 BB)
Seat 7.  Peter Walsworth  –  93,000  (5 BB)
Seat 8.  Michael Rosenberg  –  103,000  (5 BB)
Seat 9.  Phil Hui  –  7,000  (1/3 BB)