McNulty Leads 17 Players from Day 1a of Event #1: $560 NLH
Thad McNulty of Jacksonville, Florida leads a field of 17 players after Day 1a of Event #1: $560 NLH in the 2022 Winter Open at bestbet Jacksonville. The 17 remaining players survived a field of 136 runners with action stopping at 8:15 left in Level 13.
McNulty took the lead with a late charge that really got going when he knocked out Dina Rylander with ace-queen. Over the last few levels, McNulty picked up over 200,000 chips and will return on Day 2 with 353,000. Other players returning for Day 2 include Ronald Johnston, Joshua Burbul, Richard Padin, Matthew Sundberg, and Pom Souvannasoth.
Event #1: $560 NLH Day 1a Top 10 Chip Counts
| Place | Player | Chip Count | Big Blinds |
| 1 | Thad McNulty | 353,000 | 117 |
| 2 | Enrico DiFranco | 332,000 | 111 |
| 3 | Ronald Johnston | 285,000 | 95 |
| 4 | Steve Zhang | 238,000 | 79 |
| 5 | Joshua Burbul | 192,000 | 64 |
| 6 | Pom Souvannasoth | 164,000 | 55 |
| 7 | Richard Padin | 145,000 | 48 |
| 8 | William Thomas | 145,000 | 48 |
| 9 | Matthew Sundberg | 128,000 | 42 |
| 10 | Jean Tenhulzen | 126,000 | 42 |
Day 1a Action
Jean Tenhulzen took an early pot from Casey Jarzabek enroute to finding a bag at the end of the day. Tenhulzen finished the day strong and will return for Day 2 with 126,000.
Enrico “Rich” DiFranco built one of the early big stacks and made plenty of noise throughout the day, including a big call to knock Mark Manesh out of the tournament and move above 300,000 chips. DiFranco will return for Day 2 just behind the chip leader with 332,000. Elsewhere, Steve Zhang chipped up late and sits near the top of the leaderboard after he brought the evening to an end with a double knockout when he caught an ace on the river to crack kings.
Day 1b will kick off tomorrow at 12 p.m. EST and the flight will play until 12.5% of the players remain. The tournament will once again play 30-minute levels with 20,000 in starting chips. Day 1a survivors may continue to buy-in and they will take their largest chip stack to Day 2.
Be sure to join us again tomorrow and throughout the rest of the 2022 Winter Open at bestbet Jacksonville for updates from the PokerNews live reporting team.