Mike McDonald is the $10,300 partypoker MILLION North America High Roller Champion for $200,000!
Canada's own Mike McDonald has taken down the $10,300 partypoker MILLION North America High Roller for CA$200,000, topping a field of 47 unique players and a total of 53 entries, making up a prizepool of $530,000!
McDonald defeated Marc-Olivier Carpentier-Perrault heads-up after barely an hour of play. Perrault began with the chip lead, but the two Canadian pros swapped stacks a number of times before McDonald eventually came out on top. In the final hand, McDonald flopped a set of sixes while Perrault backed into a smaller full house. All of the money went in on the river in a massive cooler, but Perrault took the beat very well and accepted his consolation prize of CA$130,000.
The high roller was a last-minute addition to the schedule this week, and guaranteed a prizepool of $500,000. The tournament began with seven entries but quickly increased to 46 by the time play completed for the night on Day 1. Since registration was open until the end of the first level on Day 2, there was no doubt there would be some last minute entries. The final number of entries reached 53, allowing the tournament to pay six spots with CA$200,000 for first place and a min-cash of CA$20,000.
The unofficial final table began with nine, and none other than high roller specialist, Jason Koon, was the first to go. Koon ran ace-king suited into Perrault's aces and that was all she wrote. John Krpan was one of the players who registered at the start of Day 2. He managed to run his stack up but eventually got his aces cracked by McDonald's pocket sevens. The flop gave McDonald a straight draw and he nailed it on the turn, sending Krpan home just two spots from the money.
With seven players remaining, play tightened up since they were on the money bubble. Ryan Yu was quite short already and decided to run with a couple of paint cards. Unfortunately for him, McDonald woke up to ace-king on the button and he was unable to pull ahead.
After the elimination of Yu in 7th place, the remaining six players were in the money, guaranteed a payout of CA$20,000. The first player to go was Vishal Singh Maini, who was the next shortest stack after Yu. Maini began the day with the second-most chips and made his way to the final table, but was unable to get anything going. He got it in good against Sorel Mizzi, but unfortunately for him, the river gave him a flush and Maini was the first player to make the money.
Benoit Galland was quite aggressive for the majority of the final table, and eventually fell at the hands of McDonald on a failed bluff attempt. McDonald slow-played a set and backed into a boat, all while getting Galland to ship his stack in on the river. Galland had slightly less chips than McDonald and found himself out in 5th place for CA$30,000.
Four-handed play last for about 90 minutes before partypoker's own Roberto Romanello was eliminated. He got his chips in the middle in a flip with two suited over cards to Perrault's pocket sevens but couldn't catch up. The pro pocketed CA$50,000 for his deep run in 4th place.
Sorel Mizzi got into a few big pots with Perrault and eventually became the short stack three-handed. He ended up getting his stack in the middle with ace-jack suited but Perrault went with a suited queen and flopped a pair, sending Mizzi home with CA$84,100 for 3rd place.
Here is a look at the final results for the High Roller:
| Place | Player Name | Country | Prize |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Mike McDonald | Canada | $200,000 |
| 2 | Marc-Olivier Carpentier-Perrault | Canada | $130,000 |
| 3 | Sorel Mizzi | Canada | $84,100 |
| 4 | Roberto Romanello | United Kingdom | $50,000 |
| 5 | Benoit Galland | Canada | $30,000 |
| 6 | Vishal Singh Maini | United Kingdom | $20,000 |
The field was stacked throughout the entire tournament, but some of the players who made it to Day 2 but did not cash included John Duthie, Sam Trickett, Jonathan Duhamel, Niall Farrell, Cate Hall, Maria Ho, Kristen Bicknell, Xuan Liu, Pascal Lefrancois, and Michael Addamo
Some of the early exits on Day 1 included Ari Engel, Marc-Andre Ladouceur, Justin Ligeri, Vojtech Ruzicka, Jonathan Jaffe, and Francois Billard.
Even though the high roller is over, the action is just heating up in the CA$5,300/$4,000 Main Event! With CA$5,000,000 guaranteed in the prizepool, and at least CA$1,000,000 for the winner, the high rollers have plenty of time to hop in to Live Day 1b tomorrow at noon, or register within the first two levels of Day 2 on Sunday at noon. Players have the chance to buy in on each starting day, along with one re-entry per day, and carry their biggest stack over to Day 2.
Keep following along as the PokerNews team continues to report all of the action on the journey to crowning Canada's first partypoker MILLION North America winner!