James Carroll Wins 2014 World Poker Tour Bay 101 Main EventPoker Pro Captures First WPT Title And $1.25 Million First-Place Prize |
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Less than a week after topping a 613-entry field in a $550 Wynn Classic prelim James Carroll emerged victorious in the 2014 World Poker Tour Bay 101 Shooting Star $7,500 no-limit hold’em main event. Carroll overcame a record field of 718 entries to win his first major live tournament, the $1,256,550 first-place prize and 1,824 Card Player Player of the Year points. As a result of these two wins Carroll has ascended to fifth place in the overall POY race standings, with 2,244 points and $1,302,856 in year-to-date earnings.
Carroll entered the final table of six in fourth chip position, but he was able to build his stack throughout the night, knocking out former champion of this event Nam Le in fifth place and also eliminating third-place finisher Shaun Suller. That left Carroll heads-up with Dylan Wilkerson, with Carroll holding a roughly 4-to-3 chip advantage over Wilkerson, who had finished runner-up in the WPT Fallsview Poker Classic main event just weeks ago. Carroll quickly extended that lead and only 15 hands later the final hand arose.
Wilkerson opened to 500,000 on the button and Carroll made the call. The flop brought the 942 and Carroll checked. Wilkerson again bet 500,000. Carroll put in a check-raise to 1.3 million and Wilkerson called. The 2 hit the board on the turn and Carroll checked. Wilkerson moved all in for roughly 4.5 million. Carroll called with the 64 which was ahead of Wilkerson’s A5. As long as the river didn’t bring an ace, three or five Carroll would be the new champion.
The dealer burned and turned the Q up on the river, sending Wilkerson to the rail in second place yet again. This time he took home $728,650 and 1,520 POY points for his deep run. As a result of his two huge WPT runner-up showings Wilkerson now sits in third place in the overall POY standings with 2,520 points and $934,575 in year-to-date earnings.
Here is a look at the payouts and POY points awarded at this final table:
Place | Player | Earnings (USD) | POY Points |
1 | James Carroll | $1,256,550 | 1,824 |
2 | Dylan Wilkerson | $728,650 | 1,520 |
3 | Shaun Suller | $477,470 | 1,216 |
4 | Mukul Pahuja | $320,800 | 912 |
5 | Nam Le | $223,810 | 760 |
6 | Garrett Greer | $174,080 | 608 |
Photos courtesy of Joe Giron / World Poker Tour.