Vanessa Selbst became the first female winner of a PokerStars North American Poker Tour (NAPT) Main Event after coming out on top in Mohegan Sun. She collected $750,000 for her efforts.
Selbst sat at or near the top of the leaderboard for much of the tournament in a unique wire-to-wire run. Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar was the first player ousted from the final table of the NAPT Mohegan Sun Main Event. Aguiar was all-in on his final hand holding A-Q offsuit against Michael Woods’ wired pair of tens. The flop came 8-3-2, all blanks for the acclaimed internet pro, and the turn was a four. Woods hit a third ten on the river, sending Aguiar out of the $5,000 buy-in tournament in eighth place for $60,000.
Ousted in seventh place was online poker industry icon Cliff “JohnnyBax” Josephy. A World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet winner, Josephy open-shoved all-in with A-5 of hearts and found a caller in Derek Raymond, who had him dominated with A-9. The flop came ace-high, giving both players top pair, but Josephy never caught up and was sent into the Connecticut night in seventh place for $85,000.
Raymond was the next to go. After Selbst made an abnormally large pre-flop re-raise, Raymond committed his chips with A-10. Selbst flipped over a real hand, pocket sixes, and the two were in a race for Raymond’s tournament life. The board came Q-K-7-8-4 and that was all she wrote for Raymond, who departed the NAPT Mohegan Sun Main Event $115,000 richer for his wear.
Alistar Melville was ousted in fifth place and pocketed $150,000. Melville was in prime position to double up with pocket queens against the A-Q of Mike Beasley, but an ace on the flop put him in dire straights. The case queen in the deck failed to fall on the turn or river and Melville was sent home.
Shortly thereafter, Scott Seiver, who has been on a live tournament tear of epic proportions in recent months, fell with pocket fours against Woods’ A-3. Woods spiked an ace on the flop and never looked back. Seiver earned $190,000 for his efforts and amazingly has four five-figure cashes in the last four months. Seiver’s largest came after he won the L.A. Poker Classic’s High Roller tournament for $425,000. Despite ousting Seiver, Woods held 6.2 million chips entering three-handed play, four million short of Selbst. Beasley held just 4.8 million.
Woods hit the rails in third place in the NAPT Mohegan Sun Main Event and banked $240,000. Woods pushed all-in over the top of a raise by Selbst with 10-9 on a flop of 9-8-6 for top pair and a gutshot straight draw. Selbst, however, flipped up pocket eights for middle set. The board ran out A-10 and, despite making two pair on the river, Woods was eliminated. Selbst held a 7:1 chip lead entering heads-up play against Beasley, who sat atop the leaderboard entering the final table.
In took only a few hands for play to wrap up in the NAPT Mohegan Sun Main Event. Beasley was all-in with Q-10 against Selbst’s A-8. The board ran out 3-6-K-7-8 and Selbst was crowned the winner. Selbst hails from nearby New Haven, Connecticut and told PokerStars staff following her monumental win what it felt like to take the event down in her own stomping grounds: “It feels awesome. The most meaningful part of this for me was definitely having a lot of my friends that don’t play poker and a lot of my friends from law school see this, and my girlfriend was able to come. It was just really great to have everybody here and to see this. This is the hugest moment that I’ve had in poker so far, so it was really nice to have everybody so close.”
If you missed it, the tournament will air on May 10th on ESPN2 as part of the network’s coverage of the NAPT. Here’s how the final table shook out:
1st Place: Vanessa Selbst – $750,000
2nd Place: Michael Beasley – $428,000
3rd Place: Michael Woods – $240,000
4th Place: Scott Seiver – $190,000
5th Place: Alistar Melville – $150,000
6th Place: Derek Raymond – $115,000
7th Place: Cliff “JohnnyBax” Josephy – $85,000
8th Place: Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar – $60,244
On Monday and Tuesday, the $25,000 High Roller Bounty Shootout will play out from Mohegan Sun. Stay tuned to Poker News Daily for the latest NAPT coverage.
