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Jason Koon Wins Final Event of Triton Super High Roller Series Montenegro for $3.57 Million

Jason Koon has just snagged the largest score of his live poker career at the Triton Super High Roller Series Montenegro. On Saturday, he took down the HKD $1 Million Short Deck Ante-Only event to win HKD $28.1 million ($3.57 million USD).

Also making the final table of the event was Phil Ivey who ultimately finished third for an HKD$ 13.08 million ($1.66 million) payday. Ivey has won over $2.2 million over the last week and looks ready to make his return to the World Series of Poker.

Jason Koon Wins HKD $1 Million Short Deck Event For $3.5 Million

The final event of the 2018 Triton Super High Roller Series Montenegro concluded on Saturday as Jason Koon took down the HKD $1 Million Short Deck Ante Only Event. The tournament drew a massive field of 103 entries to create the largest prize pool in the history of the Triton series.

The prize pool at the close of registration stood at HKD $96.90 million (~12.34 million USD) and awarded HKD$ 28.10 million ($3.57 million USD) to first. Each of the final four players earned at least $1.66 million USD.

The final table was reached on Friday, and it was a truly global affair. Canada was represented by Peter Jetten, China by Xuan Tan, Hong Kong by Winfred Yu, France by Rui Cao and the United States by both Jason Koon and Phil Ivey.

Ivey and Koon both made the final table in the HK$ 250,000 version of this tournament earlier in the series. Koon finished fourth that day and Ivey won the event for his first victory in two and a half years.

The tables were a bit flipped this time around as Ivey fell in fourth place. Ivey put the last of his stack at risk with pocket jacks and Koon called with Jh-10c. While normally a suspect play in standard NL Hold’em, in this Short Deck version, straights are much more likely since deuces through fives are all removed from the deck.

That became crucial for Koon as the flop fell 9s-8c-6h to give him an open-ended straight draw. The turn produced the 7c to fill his straight and the river bricked to send Ivey home in third place.

Heads-up play in this event was between Koon and Xuan Tan but Tan had a tough road to hoe as he was at a 3:1 chip disadvantage. He managed to get some back but never was able to take the lead in the matchup.

The final hand saw all of Xuan’s chips go into the pot on a flop of Ac-Kc-Kd. Koon made the easy call with Ks-Qd and Tan revealed his gutshot straight draw with Jh-10h. Koon was actually hoping that Tan would hit is queen and the turn produced the Qc to give Tan Broadway but it also gave Koon an unbeatable full house.

Tan had to settle for second place, but still earned a nice payday of HKD$ 18.12 million ($2.3 million USD). This is far and above the best score of his live poker career as he only had about $473k in career earnings before this event.

Jason Koon earned the largest score of his live career with his HKD $28.1 million ($3.57 million USD) win. His victory earned him more than double his previous career-best score of $1.65 million won in the $100k Super High Roller of the 2017 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure (PCA).

Ivey Wins $2.2 Million at Triton Super High Roller Series Montenegro

It’s safe to say that Phil Ivey is back after a pair of final table appearances in this series, including a victory in the HK$ 250,000 version of this event. For the series, he has earned over $2.2 million to give him his best live earnings since 2014.

Ivey’s victory allowed him to leapfrog John Juanda for 7th on Poker’s All-Time Money List. With Saturday’s score, Ivey now has around $26 million and is within striking distance of both Fedor Holz and Justin Bonomo.

Ivey revealed after his victory in the HK$ 250k Short Stack Event that he plans to play the 2018 World Series of Poker. Ivey has skipped the past two WSOPs despite being one of only four players in history to win at least 10 WSOP bracelets.

Ivey is in a tie with Doyle Brunson and Johnny Chan for second on the career bracelets list and trails Phil Hellmuth’s 14. While some will argue that Ivey has simply played well in two events in a variant that’s still relatively new to the poker world, it still goes to show just how proficient one of the game’s greats still is. It will be interesting to see how he performs this summer and whether he can add to his career bracelet total.

Photo Credit – en.clubpoker.net

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