NBC National Heads Up Tournament

2009 NBC National Heads Up Tournament

March 13th, 2009

Of all the tournaments of the year, the NBC Heads Up Tournament may be one of the funnest events of the year. In a sixty-four player field similar to NCAA’s March Madness, sixty four of the best online players in the world gathered at Caesars in Vegas to determine the best heads up no limit player of the year. At the selection party the night before the poker tournament, players are seeded and put against an opponent for advancement into the round of thirty-two. Many interesting match ups were seen in the first round of the tournament. Interesting matchups in the first round included PokerStars pros Daniel Negreanu vs. Chris Moneymaker, Mike Matusow vs. Dario Minieri, Full Tilt poker originals Erik Lindgren vs. Howard Lederer, and two online high stakes regulars David Benyamine vs. Gus Hansen. As it turned out, Negreanu beat Moneymaker, Minieri beat Negreanu, Lindgren defeated the professor, and Hansen beat Benyamine. Other notable first round finishes included Vannessa Rousso defeating Doyle Brunson, Peter Eastgate over Andy Bloch, and actor Brad Garrett advancing over Annie Duke.
Rousso had her work cut out for her in round two, however, being matched up with Phil Ivey. First round survivors Daniel Negreanu and Dario Minieri were matched up. Gus Hansen was paired up with one of the only men to cash in the tournament four years in a row, Huck Seed. Another interesting note took place, as the winners of the Hellmuth / Ishbia match would play the winner of the Tom Dwan / Barry Greenstein would play, leaving the door open for a possible rematch between hot NBC heads up rivals Tom Dwan and Phill Hellmuth. Rousso went through her second legend by eliminating Phil Ivey, Daniel Negreanu beat internet phenom Minieri, the Great Dane was eliminated by Huck Seed, and in an almost prophetic way, Phil Hellmuth beat qualifier Ishbia, as well as ‘durrrr‘ beating Greenstein, meaning the two would have a showdown in the sweet sixteen. Other sweet sixteen qualifiers were Paul Wasicka, Scotty Nguyen, John Juanda, online stud Bertrand ‘Elky’ Grospellier, David Williams, Erik Lindren, John Phan, Sam Farha, Kenny Tran, David Oppenheim, and Glen Chorny.
Rousso did it a gain with another impressive performance over Paul Wasicka. Daniel Negreanu showed up to his match dressed up as his opponent, Scotty Nguyen, and defeated his opposition, leaving Rousso next up in the elite eight. Grospellier and Juanda showed down in a marathon, where ‘Elky’ advanced to play the winner of the Hellmuth/Dwan showdown. The bout ended early when, on a board of A-J-5-9-9, all the money got in the middle. Dwan revealed K-9 for three of a kind, only to be trumped by Hellmuth’s 9-5 for a full house. Although all of the sweet sixteen took home $25,000 compared to the $20,000 entry, Dwan must not have been happy with his exit. David Williams defeated Erik Lindgren and Sam Farha bested John Phan to pair up against each other in the round of eight. David Oppenheim, who was added to the tournament the day of the first day when Layne Flack no showed, advanced to an improbable round of eight appearance by defeating World Series Heads Up Champion Kenny Tran. Oppenheim was matched with Huck Seed, who defeated Glen Chorny.
Vanessa Rousso was the talk of the tournament before she won a match with her signing with GoDaddy.com to be a new face of the website, one of the first non-poker related sponsorships for a poker player. She continued her heater in the tournament defeating yet another legend in Daniel Negreanu. Rousso would be paired up with the winner of the ‘Elky’/Hellmuth match. While Phil Hellmuth is in record for both the shortest NBC match as well as winning the tournament, he broke one of his own records here. On the second hand, Hellmuth picked up pocked queens and was trumped by Bertrand Grospellier ’s Aces for the new quickest match in NBC heads up history. On the other side of the bracket, David Williams was bested by Sammy Farha, who would play Huck Seed after he defeated underdog story David Oppenheim.

Huck Seed

The final four were set, and Grospellier, possibly the hottest player in poker today, took an early lead over Rousso. However, through tough play and two double ups, Rousso took the lead and finished ‘ElKy’ off when her pocket sevens trumped his K-6. On the other side, Huck Seed and Sam Farha went longer than any match in the tournament. After Farha had a dominated chip lead of 10:1, before Seed grinded back to a normal stack. With an average stack of only eight big blinds, the players got it all in when Sam Farha had A-K off vs. Seed’s 10-8 suited. Seed made a flush and earned a spot in the best 2-3 finals. In a post match interview, Seed said he felt comfortable with Rousso and never felt too worried. He beat Rousso in the first two matches, earning a $500,000 prize and his first NBC Heads up win. Seed, amazingly, has cashed all five years of the tournament, is the winningest player in tournament history, and will be the heads up champion for a year. Seed made an interesting comment on who was his toughest opponent of the entire tournament: Sam Farha. Another good year at the NBC Heads Up led to upsets, underdogs, and yet a dominating heads up player who won a $5,000 Heads Up tournament in Canada just last year taking the crown at Caesers: Huck Seed is your champion.