Who'll Be Playing in the World Series of Poker Circuit National Championship?
This past weekend, the 2012-13 World Series of Poker Circuit came to a close as the last of gold 12 ring events, the $1,675 Main Event, finished at the Harrah��s New Orleans stop. The PokerNews Live Reporting Team was on hand to report on the 762-player tournament including Luke Graham��s run to the winner��s circle. Graham not only won the $228,600 first-place prize, he also earned a seat into the National Championship, which will take place at the same venue on Wednesday, May 22, 2013.
That event is expected to draw a mix of amateurs, WSOP Circuit regulars and top pros. Team PokerStars Pro Vanessa Selbst has already been spotted in New Orleans, as have Joe Tehan, David ��ODB�� Baker, Matt Glantz and Allen Bari. There��s even rumors that some players (i.e. Phil Hellmuth and Phil Ivey) may make the trip to New Orleans after busting the World Poker Tour $25,000 Championship.
The PokerNews Live Reporting Team will be covering that tournament, which is why we thought we��d set the stage with a comprehensive guide recapping who qualified and who��s eligible to buy in. Remember, there are only three ways to get a set into the prestigious event:
- Win a WSOP Circuit Main Event or become the Casino Champion by earning the most points at a given stop
- Earn enough points to finish in the top 60 on the National Leader Board
- Be amongst the top 100 on the WSOP Player of the Year List and buy in for $10,000
The Main Event and Casino Champion Qualifiers
The 2012-13 WSOP Circuit, which consisted of 19 stops across the United States and one in Canada, began way back in August 2012 at the IP Biloxi stop. Each of those stops hosted 12 gold ring events, meaning 240 rings were awarded throughout the season (including three that went to Chris Reslock, who now holds the record for most WSOP Circuit rings with seven). Of those, 20 were $1,675 Main Event championship rings, each of which came with a seat into the National Championship.
In addition, the best all-around player at each stop was set to be the Casino Champion, which awarded a seat into the National Championship. Here's a look at the players who have qualified for the National Championship by either winning a Main Event or becoming the Casino Champion:
| Player | Hometown | Qualified | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Luke Graham | West Palm Beach, FL | Harrah��s New Orleans Main Event Champion |
| 2 | Rex Clinkscales | Las Vegas, NV | Harrah��s Philadelphia Main Event Champion |
| 3 | Chris Reslock | Atlantic City, NJ | Harrah��s Philadelphia Casino Champion |
| 4 | Jonathan Taylor | Phil Campbell, AL | The Lodge Main Event Champion |
| Horseshoe Southern Indiana Casino Champion | |||
| 5 | Chris Parsons | Mentor, OH | The Lodge Casino Champion |
| 6 | Ryan Stevenson | Horn Lake, MS | Harrah��s Tunica Main Event Champion |
| 7 | John Holley | Destin, FL | Harrah��s Tunica Casino Champion |
| 8 | David Tuthill | St. Petersburg FL | Caesars Palace LV Main Event Champion |
| 9 | Idris Gencoglu | Vancouver, BC | Caesars Palace LV Casino Champion |
| 10 | Joseph McKeehen | North Wales, PA | Caesars Atlantic City Main Event Champion |
| Harrah��s New Orleans Casino Champion | |||
| 11 | Christopher Leong | New York, NY | Caesars Atlantic City Casino Champion |
| 12 | Kevin Saul | Warrenville, IL | Foxwoods Main Event Champion |
| 13 | Timothy Kelliher | North Dighton, MA | Foxwoods Casino Champion |
| 14 | John Bowman | Hickory, NC | Harrah��s Cherokee Casino Champion |
| 15 | Juan Mendoza | Wilmington, NC | Harrah��s Cherokee Casino Champion |
| 16 | Blair Hinkle | Weatherby Lake, MO | Council Bluffs Main Event Champion |
| 17 | Mark Bonsack | Cle Elum, WA | Council Bluffs Casino Champion |
| 18 | Jeff Fielder | Des Moines, IA | Choctaw Durant Main Event Champion |
| 19 | Andrew Robinson | Hutto, TX | Choctaw Durant Casino Champion |
| 20 | Jonathan Tamayo | Humble, TX | Palm Beach Kennel Club Main Event Champion |
| 21 | Samuel Panzica | Saline, MI | Palm Beach Kennel Club Casino Champion |
| 22 | Baptiste Chavaillaz | Portland, OR | Bicycle Casino Main Event Champion |
| 23 | Nathan Bjerno | Chino Hills, CA | Bicycle Casino Casino Champion |
| 24 | Jonathan Chehanske | Brigantine, NJ | Harrah��s Rincon Main Event Champion |
| 25 | Valentin Vornicu | San Diego, CA | Harrah��s Rincon Casino Champion |
| 26 | Adam Teasdale | Wilmington, NC | Harrah��s Atlantic City Main Event Champion |
| 27 | Brandon Fish | Kearney, NE | Harrah��s Atlantic City Casino Champion |
| 28 | Cary Marshall | Pottsboro, TX | Harveys Lake Tahoe Main Event Champion |
| 29 | Daniel Gilmer | Ashland, OH | Harveys Lake Tahoe Casino Champion |
| 30 | John Crncic | Vancouver, BC | River Rock (Vancouver) Main Event Champion |
| 31 | Sandra Wong | Burnaby, BC, Canada | River Rock (Vancouver) Casino Champion |
| 32 | Josh Williams | South Bend, IN | Horseshoe Hammond Main Event Champion |
| 33 | Mike Leah | Las Vegas, NV | Horseshoe Hammond Casino Champion |
| 34 | Dan Heimiller | Las Vegas, NV | Horseshoe Southern Indiana Main Event Champion |
| 35 | Quan Nguyen | Garland, TX | Bossier City Casino Champion |
| 36 | Jeff Gibralter | Rockwall, TX | Bossier City Main Event Champion |
| 37 | Kyle Cartwright | Bartlett, TN | IP Biloxi Main Event Champion |
| 38 | Cory Wood | Murfreesboro, TN | IP Biloxi Casino Champion |
The At-Large Qualifiers
In addition to the qualifiers, players who collected enough points on the National Leader Board earned a spot into the National Championship. Only 60 seats were supposed to be awarded through this process, but since two players won two seats by winning a Main Event and capturing a Casino Championship �� Joseph McKeehen won the Caesars Atlantic City Main Event and finished as the Harrah��s New Orleans Casino Champion, while Jonathan Taylor took down The Lodge Main Event and finished as Horseshoe Southern Indiana Casino Champion �� two extra seats were added to the pool. That meant there were 62 at-large seats for grabs, which was good news for Doug ��Rico�� Carli and Kevin Eyster, who were just below the initial cutoff.
With that said, the National Championship bubble boy was Brett Schwertley, who had the same number of points as Eyster, but lost the money-earned tiebreaker by nearly $40,000.
Here are the players who earned a seat:
| Rank | Player | Points | Rings | Cashes | Earnings |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ari Engel | 252.5 | 2 | 14 | $116,149 |
| 2 | Trevor Deeter | 225 | 1 | 12 | $74,277 |
| 3 | Pedro Rios | 222.5 | 0 | 13 | $171,848 |
| 4 | Aaron Massey | 222.5 | 2 | 10 | $99,788 |
| 5 | Nancy Birnbaum | 197.5 | 2 | 7 | $67,005 |
| 6 | Charles ��Woody�� Moore | 195 | 0 | 11 | $55,692 |
| 7 | Yossi Azulay | 192.5 | 0 | 13 | $82,908 |
| 8 | Shawn Daniels | 192.5 | 0 | 10 | $49,782 |
| 9 | Stephen Hesse | 190 | 1 | 12 | $71,669 |
| 10 | Sean Small | 182.5 | 0 | 12 | $128,988 |
| 11 | Michael Sanders | 182.5 | 1 | 9 | $119,881 |
| 12 | Carter Myers | 182.5 | 1 | 8 | $75,915 |
| 13 | Caufman Talley | 180 | 2 | 6 | $104,914 |
| 14 | Ray Henson | 180 | 3 | 5 | $82,273 |
| 15 | Ting Ho | 180 | 0 | 12 | $53,616 |
| 16 | David Nicholson | 177.5 | 1 | 11 | $79,377 |
| 17 | Josh Pender | 177.5 | 1 | 16 | $62,755 |
| 18 | DJ Mackinnon | 177.5 | 1 | 11 | $57,106 |
| 19 | Phillip Hui | 177.5 | 1 | 14 | $46,417 |
| 20 | Robert Panitch | 175 | 1 | 8 | $66,542 |
| 21 | Tripp Kirk | 172.5 | 0 | 9 | $237,515 |
| 22 | Benjamin Reason | 172.5 | 1 | 8 | $90,651 |
| 23 | Jonathan Hilton | 167.5 | 1 | 8 | $87,766 |
| 24 | Mark Maletic | 167.5 | 0 | 10 | $81,137 |
| 25 | Travell Thomas | 167.5 | 1 | 9 | $57,383 |
| 26 | Jarod Ludemann | 165 | 0 | 10 | $57,451 |
| 27 | Wendy Freedman | 162.5 | 1 | 7 | $59,147 |
| 28 | Nicolas Vaca-Rondon | 160 | 1 | 10 | $103,621 |
| 29 | Blake Barousse | 160 | 2 | 6 | $86,590 |
| 30 | Chris Conrad | 157.5 | 1 | 8 | $38,217 |
| 31 | Thomas Beckstead | 155 | 0 | 10 | $44,119 |
| 32 | Drennon Rackley | 152.5 | 0 | 12 | $51,494 |
| 33 | David Pecaski | 152.5 | 0 | 7 | $41,794 |
| 34 | Allen Kessler | 152.5 | 1 | 10 | $39,147 |
| 35 | Michael Jukich | 150 | 0 | 8 | $96,860 |
| 36 | William Byrnes | 150 | 1 | 10 | $41,774 |
| 37 | Alex Masek | 150 | 2 | 8 | $39,396 |
| 38 | Josh Reichard | 147.5 | 0 | 11 | $69,567 |
| 39 | Nick Jivkov | 147.5 | 2 | 7 | $50,389 |
| 40 | Everett Carlton | 147.5 | 0 | 10 | $49,510 |
| 41 | Pavlin Karakikov | 147.5 | 0 | 11 | $38,404 |
| 42 | Ryan Riess | 145 | 0 | 10 | $266,349 |
| 43 | Ashly Butler | 145 | 1 | 6 | $42,879 |
| 44 | Frederic Roetker | 145 | 1 | 8 | $35,074 |
| 45 | Krzysztof Stybaniewicz | 145 | 1 | 7 | $33,818 |
| 46 | Ping Liu | 142.5 | 0 | 9 | $119,679 |
| 47 | Ryan Lenaghan | 142.5 | 1 | 7 | $68,200 |
| 48 | Cord Garcia | 142.5 | 1 | 7 | $60,655 |
| 49 | Austin Apicella | 142.5 | 2 | 5 | $51,574 |
| 50 | Paul Sokoloff | 142.5 | 0 | 9 | $42,712 |
| 51 | Josh Palmer | 142.5 | 0 | 11 | $34,371 |
| 52 | Bryan Campanello | 140 | 1 | 5 | $154,115 |
| 53 | Kurt Jewell | 140 | 1 | 6 | $57,001 |
| 54 | Austin Buchanan | 140 | 0 | 12 | $53,488 |
| 55 | Cory Waaland | 135 | 1 | 4 | $134,832 |
| 56 | Jessie Bryant | 135 | 1 | 8 | $65,530 |
| 57 | Alex Bylicki | 132.5 | 1 | 8 | $44,845 |
| 58 | Allan Farber | 130 | 1 | 10 | $41,985 |
| 59 | Jason Mayfield | 130 | 1 | 9 | $38,677 |
| 60 | Wade Woelfel | 127.5 | 0 | 12 | $142,221 |
| 61 | Doug ��Rico�� Carli | 127.5 | 0 | 16 | $23,057 |
| 62 | Kevin Eyster | 125 | 1 | 5 | $121,421 |
The Eligible 100 WSOP POY Players
Finally, there are 100 Player of the Year qualifiers who��re eligible to play, albeit with the caveat that they fork over a $10,000 buy-in. It��s hard to say how many of those players will enter, but early estimations have it between 20-30 players.
With that said, PokerNews has learned that the following players will be making the trip to New Orleans: Vanessa Selbst, Jason Koon, Jeff Gross, Kyle Julius, Allen Bari, Matt Glantz, David ��ODB�� Baker, Dominik Nitsche and Joe Tehan.
Here are the players from the WSOP POY who are eligible to buy-in:
| Place | Player | Points |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Phil Hellmuth | 1,644.58 |
| 2 | Greg Merson | 1,007.38 |
| 3 | Michael Mizrachi | 978.70 |
| 4 | Ben Lamb | 909.05 |
| 5 | John Monnette | 884.13 |
| 6 | Jason Mercier | 818.64 |
| 7 | Brian Rast | 775.30 |
| 8 | Chris Moorman | 753.10 |
| 9 | Antonio Esfandiari | 753.10 |
| 10 | Shawn Buchanan | 739.37 |
| 11 | Andrew Frankenberger | 721.86 |
| 12 | David ��ODB�� Baker | 692.71 |
| 13 | Bertrand ��ElkY�� Grospellier | 683.77 |
| 14 | Joseph Cheong | 609.13 |
| 15 | Oleksii Kovalchuk | 597.63 |
| 16 | Viacheslav Zhukov | 570.50 |
| 17 | Pius Heinz | 570.00 |
| 18 | Phil Ivey | 568.70 |
| 19 | John Juanda | 565.60 |
| 20 | Tristan Wade | 563.21 |
| 21 | David ��Bakes�� Baker | 546.80 |
| 22 | Matt Matros | 544.25 |
| 23 | Timothy Adams | 532.78 |
| 24 | Nick Schulman | 531.23 |
| 25 | Vanessa Selbst | 523.67 |
| 26 | Andrew Lichtenberger | 501.19 |
| 27 | Roger Hairabedian | 499.75 |
| 28 | Simon Charette | 497 |
| 29 | Mikhail Lakhitov | 487.50 |
| 30 | Amir Lehavot | 487.50 |
| 31 | Mark Radoja | 481.88 |
| 32 | Barry Greenstein | 478.13 |
| 33 | Daniel Idema | 473.13 |
| 34 | Ali Eslami | 469.15 |
| 35 | Jeremy Ausmus | 467.94 |
| 36 | Stephen Chidwick | 462.29 |
| 37 | Martin Staszko | 446.00 |
| 38 | Jake Cody | 445.23 |
| 39 | Konstantin Puchkov | 441.18 |
| 40 | Eddie Blumenthal | 435.55 |
| 41 | Brent Hanks | 434.25 |
| 42 | Foster Hays | 429.25 |
| 43 | Brandon Cantu | 426.00 |
| 44 | Daniel O��Brien | 420.56 |
| 45 | Andy Bloch | 420.30 |
| 46 | Mark Schmid | 419.50 |
| 47 | Roland Israelashvili | 418.05 |
| 48 | Marvin Rettemaier | 417.98 |
| 49 | Sam Stein | 416.13 |
| 50 | Maria Ho | 416.00 |
| 51 | Jonathan Aguiar | 414.25 |
| 52 | Joe Ebanks | 410.25 |
| 53 | Jason Somerville | 408.25 |
| 54 | Owais Ahmed | 408.03 |
| 55 | Brock Parker | 407.49 |
| 56 | Steve Billirakis | 406.89 |
| 57 | Chris Bjorin | 401.88 |
| 58 | Hans Winzeler | 396.73 |
| 59 | Chris Klodnicki | 396.51 |
| 60 | Athanasios Polychronopoulos | 396.13 |
| 61 | Erik Cajelais | 395.55 |
| 62 | Chris DeMaci | 386.53 |
| 63 | Kyle Julius | 383.32 |
| 64 | Elio Fox | 382.50 |
| 65 | Jarred Solomon | 376.75 |
| 66 | Andrew Badecker | 376.75 |
| 67 | John Racener | 372.27 |
| 68 | Sean Getzwiller | 370.88 |
| 69 | Neil Willerson | 370.13 |
| 70 | Taylor Paur | 369.18 |
| 71 | Brian Hastings | 367.80 |
| 72 | Mitch Schock | 364.81 |
| 73 | Jeff Gross | 364.19 |
| 74 | Joey Weissman | 363.00 |
| 75 | Jason Koon | 362.07 |
| 76 | Jesse Sylvia | 361.50 |
| 77 | Antonin Teisseire | 359.05 |
| 78 | Eric Froehlich | 357.55 |
| 79 | David Bach | 354.75 |
| 80 | Dominik Nitsche | 351.13 |
| 81 | Layne Flack | 350.78 |
| 82 | Sam Trickett | 350.30 |
| 83 | Matt Glantz | 349.20 |
| 84 | Max Steinberg | 348.44 |
| 85 | Eugene Katchalov | 348.06 |
| 86 | Vladimir Mefodichev | 347.25 |
| 87 | Nelson Robinson | 343.00 |
| 88 | Joe Tehan | 341.29 |
| 89 | Dan Smith | 340.38 |
| 90 | George Lind | 339.30 |
| 91 | Dung Nguyen | 337.50 |
| 92 | Matt Stout | 336.00 |
| 93 | Joe Kuether | 335.13 |
| 94 | Rep Porter | 335.08 |
| 95 | Randolph Lanosga | 334.70 |
| 96 | Allen Bari | 373.26 |
| 97 | Dror Michaelo | 335.50 |
| 98 | Fabrice Soulier | 369.38 |
| 99 | Jon Lane | 354.24 |
| 100 | Steve Landfish | 363.27 |
Remember, PokerNews will be live reporting the WSOP National Championship in its entirety, which you can follow on our live reporting pages. Who��ll win the prestigious event and take home the coveted WSOP bracelet? We��ll have our answer by the end of the week.
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