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2008 WSOP |
Somebody once made the reasonable observation that paybacks are hell. This was pretty much the theme of the Seniors No Limit Holdem event. Day 2 ended with Dale Eberle knocking Dan LaCourse out of the chip lead on the last hand, and Day 3 ended with Dan LaCourse knocking Dale Eberle out of the tournament and collecting his bracelet on the last hand of the day. If given a chance, Dale would probably have given up his Day 2 chip lead in order to be the one doing the eliminating at the end of Day 3. At the start of Day 3, only 50,000 chips separated Eberle and LaCourse.
During the first stages of the final table not much happened, and everything moved along at a slow, leisurely pace. After the first dozen hands or so, these players just tore into each other and played down to a champion in less than four hours.
"Mad" Marty Wilson was the first victim of the day. Marty was all in with pocket eights against Fred Berger's A-Q. After a Q-Q-K flop, Mad Marty's only hope was running eights on the turn and river. Anybody familiar with senior citizens knows that running anything is rarely on the menu, and Marty Wilson was out in 9th place.
Ed Clark and his A-7 said hello to the rail after an unfriendly board refused to help him out and he was beaten by Marc Fluss's pocket nines.
Dan LaCourse scored the next elimination and finished off Peter Silverstein who had been crippled the hand before by Fred Berger. Silverstein looked good after the flop in this hand, his 2-4 matching up well with the 10-6-4 flop, but LaCourse's A-Q got a King on the turn and an unlikely, back breaking Jack on the river and Silverstein was sent out in 7th place on a bad beat.
Charles Wood owned sixth place after making a tactical error and going all in after the turn card left the board as 3-8-10-3. He was holding a K-6 that matched nothing on the board, but figured some aggression would knock everyone else out. He figured wrong and Marc Fluss's K-10 finished Wood's day.
Fred Berger had a good run until he was all in and learned the pocket deuces were very little good against pocket Jacks. Dan LaCourse and his two Jacks solidified their position when a third Jack fell on the flop. Berger had a better chance of turning water into bourbon than getting running deuces, so his eject button was pressed in fifth place.
Jerry Yamachika was the next person to feel the wrath of LaCourse as a promising hand didn't get any turn or river support. His pair of Jacks fell to LaCourse's two ladies. Jerry was gone with fourth place money.
With three players left, Dan LaCourse rivered a straight to eliminate Marc Fluss and take a chip lead into heads-up play against Dale Eberle.
If you blinked at the wrong time, you would have missed the entirety of this epic, single hand struggle for the Event #42 championship. With both players all in after the turn, it was LaCourse's trips that dominated Eberle's two pair. Only a King could help Dale on the river, and that simply didn't happen.
Dale Eberle, the retired Ohio Firefighter congratulated Dan LaCourse, the retired Ohio Police Detective, and accepted his second place finish. Dan LaCourse was credited his time as a police detective for his success, and stood there accepting the bracelet with his wife watching. She had flown in from Ohio when she heard he had made the final table, and was there with her suitcase still in tow when he took the trophy and said, "I have always wanted this and to be standing here with a gold bracelet and this moment is very special to me."
The entire seniors event was a lot of fun and we congratulate Dan LaCourse on his victory!
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