Don't Look Now... Galen Hall Leads the Final Table
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That's all she wrote for Day 2 of the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure $100,000 Super High Roller event. From the starting field of 32, the final 18 returned to the tables today to play for ten eliminations. After about six hours of poker, the final table was set, and the chips were in the bags. Does anyone remember the name Galen Hall? Anyone? That's right, the 2011 PCA Main Event champion went on a monster run during the closing levels to bag up 1.748 million, and that will make him the pace-setter heading into tomorrow's finale.
Until Hall's run, it appeared that the day was going to belong to Daniel Negreanu. You poker buffs out there will recall that Negreau finished runner-up in this event last year, and his overnight count of 1.23 million puts him well on course to improve on that this time around. That's still third place, though, and it's his fellow Canadian Jonathan Duhamel who finished in second with 1.336 million.
Negreanu began his day by sending Chance Kornuth to the exit in 18th place, and he continued to chip up over the subsequent levels. With 12 players left, Negreanu and his 
found all-in action from Erik Seidel's 
, and the 
board gave Kid Poker his second KO of the day — and the chip lead. He bled a few chips over the final hour or so, but he still finished with plenty of chips with which to wage war on Day 3.
Duhamel didn't manage to eliminate anyone all day, but he still managed to nearly double up over the course of the five-level day. After a sluggish start, Duhamel needed a double through Scott Seiver to stay alive, and he wouldn't be in danger again. He continued to chip his way upward for the next couple levels to bag up his second-place stack.
We've already mentioned a couple of them, but the others to hit the rail today included Tom Marchese, Yevgeniy Timoshenko, Bertrand "ElkY" Grospellier, Jason Mercier, Will Molson, Doc Sands, and Sam Stein.
The tenth and final elimination of the day sent the start-of-day chip leader, Isaac Haxton, off to the exit with empty pockets. Haxton, in fact, had the chip lead for nearly the entire tournament, and he was abusing Galen Hall, who had been stuck on Haxton's direct right for about 95% of this event. Hall was starting to get frustrated with Haxton's aggression, but after losing several big battles, he finally managed to win the war.
Hall worked his way up over the million-chip mark by taking a big chunk of Haxton's stack when his 
turned a flush against Ike's mystery cards. Just a few hands later, Hall got the rest. With plenty of history between them, Hall figured he'd found a good spot to four-bet shove with 
. Haxton had 
, though, but his dominating hand betrayed him. The board ran 
, and that accomplished three things: (1) the elimination of Haxton, (2) Hall taking the chip lead, and (3) the end of Day 2.
Our final eight will return to the felt tomorrow at noon to play it out to the winner. Here's how they'll stack up:
| Table | Seat | Player | Chips |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | Humberto Brenes | 343,000 |
| 1 | 2 | Scott Seiver | 556,000 |
| 1 | 3 | Daniel Negreanu | 1,230,000 |
| 1 | 4 | Jonathan Duhamel | 1,336,000 |
| 1 | 5 | Mike "Timex" McDonald | 360,000 |
| 1 | 6 | Dan Shak | 1,199,000 |
| 1 | 7 | Viktor "Isildur1" Blom | 1,228,000 |
| 1 | 8 | Galen Hall | 1,748,000 |
That's all we have for tonight, but we'll see you back here tomorrow to finish the story!