There’s something about Uncasville, Connecticut that makes Vanessa Selbst feel right at home. The PokerStars pro is the chip leader going into Day 4 of the $5,000 North American Poker Tour (NAPT) Mohegan Sun Main Event, leaving her one step closer to defending her title from a year ago.
Selbst leads a field of 24 players going into Tuesday with a stack of 1,406,000. She’s been blessed with some timely river cards thus far, but that and her relentless pre-flop play have resulted in a mountain of chips with the final table in view. Selbst, who earned $750,000 for her win in this event last year, could earn another $450,000 this week to increase her career live earnings to more than $4.5 million at the age of 26.
Most of her chips came in a crucial hand against then-chip leader Vincent Rubianes toward the end of Day 3. After Selbst cold-four-bet to 109,000 pre-flop, she and Rubianes saw a flop of 10c-5d-2c. Rubianes check-called a bet of 129,000 and both players checked the Jc of the turn. The 3c put a fourth club on board and Rubianes checked again. Selbst bet 294,000 and Rubianes decided to call, but mucked his hand when he saw the Ks-Kc of Selbst, who took over the chip lead at that point.
Rubianes finished the day second in chips with 1,023,000. He’s followed by Aaron Overton (907,000), Jacobo Fernandez (813,000) and Adam Geyer (629,000) in the top five.
Day 3 began with 74 players and, with the top 56 getting paid, 18 would walk away with nothing on Monday. Among the unfortunate players falling short of the cash were Team PokerStars Online member Andrew “foucault82” Brokos, Greg Dyer, Ronnie Bardah, Kevin “1SickDisease” Eyster, Dan O’Brien, and Nick Binger, who was the Bubble Boy. Last year’s runner-up, Mike Beasley, barely snuck into the money by finishing 55th.
Others who reached the money, but failed to survive Monday were Poker News Daily Guest Columnist Bernard Lee, Greg DeBora, Jeff Papola, Lee Markholt, Matt Matros, Victor Ramdin, and Adam Junglen. The latter was sent packing late in the day by former NAPT champ Joe Tehan when his As-Js couldn’t catch up to Tehan’s pocket kings after all of the chips went in pre-flop.
Several big names still have a shot at the $450,000 first place prize, including Steve “MrTimCaum” O’Dwyer, Dan Shak, Eric “EFro” Froelich, and World Poker Tour champs Tehan, Nenad Medic, and Olivier Busquet. O’Dwyer’s run in the event has been extraordinary. At one point on Day 2, he had 10,000 chips at the 1,200/2,400 blind level before running it up to almost 800,000 on Monday.
Here’s a look at the top 10 stacks going into Day 4:
1. Vanessa Selbst – 1,406,000
2. Vincent Rubianes – 1,023,000
3. Aaron Overton – 907,000
4. Jacobo Fernandez – 813,000
5. Adam Geyer – 803,000
6. Thomas Hoglund Jr. – 629,000
7. Steve O’Dwyer – 507,000
8. Joe Tehan – 490,000
9. Dan Shak – 488,000
10. Tyler Kenney – 478,000
Play resumed at Noon ET today and will conclude when a final table of eight is reached. Last year, a talented group made the televised final table, including Selbst, Beasley, Scott Seiver, Derek Raymond, Cliff “JohnnyBax” Josephy, and Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar. Can the same be accomplished in 2011? And can Selbst pull off the repeat? Stay tuned to Poker News Daily for continuing coverage from Mohegan Sun.
