Matthew Higgins Wins The World Series Of Poker Circuit Tunica Main Event

Matthew Higgins – Photo Credit: WSOP Circuit/Horsehoe Tunica

Matthew Higgins has captured the top prize in the World Series of Poker Circuit main event that brought the tournament series to a close at the Horseshoe Casino & Hotel in Tunica, Mississippi. This takes the WSOP Circuit gold ring count for Higgins up to five thanks to four previous victories in North Carolina along with this most recent win on Jan. 29. His career earnings are now close to $1.75 million with this, his fifth six-figure score in the books.

“This is ring five. We had control for most of the day, we caught a very friendly punt early in the day that gave me the lead over everybody,” said Higgins shortly after the win to reporters.

He continued with a few thoughts when asked about the action at the final table, “I got lean on them and make them worry about ICM. I applied pressure most of the time and when we got down to three-handed, Dale (Roesel) was putting pressure on me a lot. I forgot how good he was. When BJ (McBrayer) was short, we were so deep and I had a hand that I couldn’t lay it down. It was a real friendly table, everybody battled. We weren’t going to rub anyone’s nose in any bluffs.”

The $1,700 buy-in no-limit hold’em tournament saw a field of 568 entries join the fray during two starting flights. That took the prize pool up to $791,673 to top the half-million guarantee.

The top 60 players made the money for a min-cash worth $3,356, and all of those players returned for Day 2. Notables that made a deep run in the tournament included many former WSOP Circuit victors with 14-time winner Daniel Lowery (11th), Spencer Champlin (15th), Jared Ingles (16th), and 15-time winner Maurice Hawkins (30th) all in the hunt late into the tournament.

The final day saw just a half-dozen players return with a chance at the tournament title, and Higgins was second in chips when cards got into the air. He took out Marty Martin in sixth place to take the chip lead by the first break in play, and he cruised from there to the impressive fifth WSOP Circuit title.

He never relinquished the chip lead and took out accomplished tournament professional B.J. MacBrayer in third place to take that advantage into the heads-up final as well. Higgins furthered his lead against Dale Roesel when he knocked out one of his legs and took a third of his stack in the first hand between the final two players.

All the money got in the middle only once between the final two contenders, and Higgins held Q-3 offsuit against the suited 8-4 of Roesel. Higgins found another queen on the flop, and that was it for Roesel, who took home $103,248 for the runner-up finish to take his career earnings up close to $1.3 million.

Here is a look at the payouts and POY points awarded at the final table:

The next stop on the WSOP Circuit schedule begins on Feb. 1 at the Harrah’s Pompano Beach in Florida, with a $1,700 buy-in main event that runs from Feb. 8-12. You can see the full schedule for the tournament series right here.

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