Last night, the American poker player Harut “Harry” Arutyunyan managed to win his first WSOP Circuit gold ring after taking down the WSOP Circuit Cherokee Main Event. The tournament, which took place at Harrah’s Cherokee, accumulated a player field of 1,022 entrants who were there to try winning the Main Event champion’s title and a Circuit ring apart from the first-place monetary prize.
The winning comes as the latest success in Harry Arutyunyan in the Cherokee Series, following the titles of two of his friends – Nikhil Gera, who got a gold ring earlier in the WSOP Circuit Cherokee series, and Sean Yu, who won a gold bracelet in the Global Casino Championship.
Arutyunyan, whose best live cash of $560,969 was generated by him winning the 2014 Legends of Poker $235 NLHE – Deepstack event, has boosted his total live earnings to $1,117,456 by his latest victory. The player’s entry at the Cherokee Main Event was not planned. At first, he simply got to Harrah’s Cherokee to support his good friend Sean Yu when the latter got the chip lead at the Global Casino Championship. Then, he decided to stay and made an entry to the Main Event – a decision which obviously worked out very well for him.
As mentioned above, a total of 1,022 players joined this year’s Cherokee Main Event, with their number being reduced to 19 at the end of Day 2 of the event. The beginning of the third and final day of the Main Event saw Randy Lowery as a chip leader, and Arutyunyan second in chips. However, Arutyunyan managed to take the chip lead from Lowery soon enough and kept his advantage until the very end of the game, facing Lowery in a heads-up battle for the title. His victorious march through the last day of the WSOP Circuit Cherokee Main Event took him less than six hours to be crowned as the winner.
However, it was not an easy task for Arutyunyan to conquer his first WSOP title, as he was forced to make his way up through a plethora of experienced Circuit players such as Marshall White, Chris Carey, Josh Vizcarra, Kindah Sakkal and Krzystof Stybaniewicz. Apart from the prestigious WSOP Circuit gold ring and the large monetary prize, the victory in the Cherokee Main Event made Arutyunyan one of the first two players who secured their spot in the Global Championship next year’s edition, along with Todd Mercer.
With Harry Arutyunyan emerging as the WSOP Circuit Cherokee Main Event’s victor taking home a guaranteed prize pool cash portion of $283,597, the it was Randy Lowery who got on the runner-up position, scooping a monetary prize of $175,345. The third place was occupied by Norman McKeldin, who was granted with a six-digit consolation prize estimated to $130,305.
Kindah Sakkal got fourth, followed by Scott Ryder. The sixth place in the ranking was occupied by Marshall White, while Josh Vizcarra remained seventh. The eight place in the ranking was taken by Danny Lawson, followed by Brian Feck who got ninth.
- Author
Harry Evans
