Buonocore Claims Overall Day 1 Chip Lead in MILLIONAIRE MAKER; Dedusha, Jaffee, Spinella Also Bag
On Day 1b of Event #21: $1,500 No-Limit Hold'em MILLIONAIRE MAKER, no less than 4,315 entries showed up at the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino for their shot at a life-changing seven-figure prize. In total, there were 7,361 entries spread over Day 1a and 1b and 1,104 of them made it through to Day 2, each of them already guaranteed a money finish of at least $2,249.
Taking the honor of the chip lead for Day 1b is Andrea Buonocore with 209,900 in chips, which also takes him into Day 2 as the overall chip leader. This will give him a bit of a head start in chasing that mouth-watering first-place prize of $1,173,223 and the coveted WSOP bracelet.
Buonocore had the following to say about collecting all these chips: ��I just found them all over the room. There was a hand with queens against fives somewhere.��
Trailing Buonocore in the chip counts is Thanh Nguyen with 199,500 and Artan Dedusha with 191,600. Dedusha finished in 52nd place in the 2017 WSOP Main Event and will be looking to improve that result by grabbing the title in this event.
Other notable players through to Day 2 include WSOP bracelet winners Jared Jaffee (171,900) and Anthony Spinella (162,500), two-time WSOP Circuit Ring winner Thomas Taylor (169,600), Walter Treccarichi (150,900), and former November Niner Joseph Cheong with 133,700 in chips. Taylor took some chips away from Shaun Deeb (18,200) when he made a backdoor flush.
Many notables took their seats at the tables today, and players like Taylor Black (129,500), Georgios Vrakas (96,600), Marc Macdonnell (75,500), Bart Hanson (74,400), Rainer Kempe (49,500), Ryan Laplante (33,000), Aaron Massey (28,400), Allen Kessler (25,500) and Maria Lampropulos (12,000) found a bag at the end of the day.
As some notables bagged and cashed, others fell along the wayside, including 888poker ambassador Vivian Saliba, Maurice Hawkins, Kitty Kuo, Kristen Bicknell, Adrian Mateos, Vlad Darie, Ari Engel, Dutch Boyd, Loren Klein, Matt Affleck, Martin Finger, Bryn Kenney, Kenny Hallaert, Brandon Cantu, Marcel Vonk, David Urban and Brandon Ageloff
The 1,104 remaining players will return tomorrow, Monday, June 11, at 11 a.m. local time to continue playing the remaining 24 minutes and 10 seconds in level 11, with has a small blind of 500, big blind of 1,000, and a running ante of 100. Make sure to come back as the PokerNews live reporting team will be on the floor to provide you with all the action!