Robert Nguyen Eliminated in 5th Place ($28,905)

[user38334]

Level 23 : 12,000/24,000, 3,000 ante

In the most dramatic turn of events, Robert Nguyen has just been eliminated from this event. In the biggest hand of the night so far, Paul Hoefer doubled through Nguyen, then busted the one-time monster chip leader a few hands later.

In the crippling hand, Hoefer raised to 53,000 from the cutoff and Nguyen three bet to 149,000 from the big blind. Hoefer tanked for a while before announcing "all-in". Nguyen stood straight to his feet and was in obvious distress. He took off his hat, looked at the 2 short stacks on the table and asked for a count of Hoefer's chips. The Dealer performed the count, to which he had 810,000. Nguyen looked at his own stack and stated he would be basically all-in. He looked visibly conflicted, then all of a sudden said "CALL!"

Hoefer showed .
Nguyen tables and yelled, "Yes, hold!"

The flop was safe for Nguyen with the . The turn was also safe, bringing the , but it would be the river that would do the damage, leaving him with less than 100,000 in chips.

A few hands later he moved all in for his last 50,000 in chips from the button with and was called by Hoefer holding . The board ultimately ran out to send Robert Nguyen to the rail in 5th place.