Kristen Foxen Wins Opening Event of U.S. Poker Open for $158,000

Kristen Foxen’s superb comeback with three left in the opening event of this year’s U.S. Poker Open in Las Vegas saw her claim the Golden Eagle trophy last night, and the top prize of $158,025 in the process. Ping Liu was the chief victim of her success, leading late only to lose the lead after others such as David Peters, Justin Saliba and Patrick Leonard had all cashed in the PokerGO Studio in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Field Tops a Hundred

With a massive 129 total entries, the opening event of this year’s U.S. Poker Open (USPO) was a packed house at the PokerGO Studio at ARIA on the Las Vegas Strip. With $158,025 and the PGT Golden Eagle trophy on the line, Kristen Foxen took the title after defeating Ping Liu heads-up, with 19 players making the money.

Bubble Boy in the event was the popular American professional poker player John Riordan. He lost his last chips to the 10-time WSOP bracelet winner when jack-eight was shot down by Seidel’s pocket kings. A flop of J-T-7 actually offered Riordan hope of a miraculous straight to survive but both turn and river fell blank to send him home with nothing instead.

Erik Seidel may have won the battle, but his own war lasted little longer. Busting in 14^th place for $12,900, he was one of a slew of players who slid out of contention but made the money places, including Eric Blair, Dylan Weisman and Eric Baldwin all claiming a min-cash of $9,675. Others such as Jim Collopy (12^th for $16,125), Patrick Leonard (10^th for $17,738) and Japanese star Masato Yokosawa (8^th for $25,800) all busted before the final table.

David Peters Crashes Out

Yokosawa’s elimination was the final table bubble and his defeat to Ping Liu put the latter in second position, only behind Francis Anderson at the top of the chipcounts. Justin Saliba was busted first in seventh for $25,800 when he shoved with king-five only for Ping Liu to call with ace-jack of spades. A board of A-Q-2-Q-K meant Liu leaped up the leaderboard as Saliba left the action.

Another U.S. poker star departed in sixth place for $32,250 in the form of David Peters. One of the most revered players in live poker history, Peters’ ace-nine lost to Liu’s king-six after a six arrived on the flop and river to give the dominating player in terms of chips a vital hand of trip sixes, or ‘The Devils’ Hand’.

Michael Arellano exited in fifth place for $38,700 when the satellite winner ran into the eventual winner. Arellano was all-in with the best hand of ace-queen but lost to Kristen Foxen’s dominated queen-deuce, a cruel board of 6-3-3-9-2 coming to dash Arellano’s chances and boost Foxen’s stack in the process.

Foxen Pounces as Liu and Hu Lose

With four players left, Anthony Hu lost a coinflip to Francis Anderson as the latter’s queen-jack took out Hu with pocket fours for $51,600. Three-handed, Ping Liu led with a vast stack, at one point holding more chips on his own than both Foxen and Anderson put together, but Anderson doubled through the leader to change the script.

Foxen then flopped trips, leaving Anderson the short stack and he duly busted soon after when Foxen’s queen-high led Anderson’s jack-high pre-flop post-flop and on the river as play was sent heads-up. Foxen, who has an excellent heads-up record, was sat ith 80% of the chips in play and soon she had them all.

All-in with ace-seven of hearts, Foxen only had to hold against Liu’s king-jack to win the tournament and a flop including two hearts set her up perfectly and removed one of Liu’s outs. A third heart on the board landed on the turn and it confirmed Foxen’s victory for $158,025 as Liu walked away with $96,750 as runner-up.