The son of longtime poker pro Bernard Lee put on a shooting clinic during a UMass women’s basketball game halftime contest that paid the college student $10,000. Or, it should have.
Noam Lee had 30 seconds to make a layup, free-throw, three-pointer, and then a half-court shot to win the money. He not only did that, but he made all four shots with time to spare. The sparse crowd inside the Mullins Center in Amherst, Massachusetts erupted after the final shot went through the net. Josh Schreiber, a friend of the presumed winner shared a video of it all on X.
Not So Fast, My Friend
Despite making all four shots within the allotted time, the senior operations and info management major at UMass found out some bad news before leaving the arena. He received a form during the third quarter that he was required to sign. It was to acknowledge he understood the rules of the contest hosted by Odds On Promotions, according to Massachusetts Daily Collegian, the university’s newspaper.
The promotion company not only has strict rules for the contest, but also intended to enforce those rules. One such rule is that the contestant cannot have a foot on the line or the shot won’t count. After reviewing footage, it was determined that a foot was indeed on the line during one of the shots.
“[On Thursday], I got an email from the UMass athletics representative saying that the promotion company got back to them and said my foot was on the line and they will not be paying it out, which is obviously a little disappointing,” the college student told UMass’ media outlet.
Lee didn’t end up empty-handed, however. He was offered courtside seats to future home games, $100 in gift cards to spend at the basketball arena, and another try at the shooting contest, but with a $1,000 payout instead of the much larger prize he thought he’d won.
Poker Vlogger Steps Up
Ethan “Rampage” Yau, a popular poker vlogger and WPT Global ambassador, caught wind of the situation that occurred at his alma mater. The high-stakes poker player referred to the ruling as a “scam,” and generously offered to give Lee some of his own money.
“As a UMass grad, this is pretty lame. Can someone get me in touch with the winner, I’ll give him 5K. When I was in college, winning even 1K would’ve been year changing for me. You can’t scam college students like this,” Yau tweeted.
Rampage then mentioned he spent “thousands of hours” working the concession stands inside Mullins Center, home to the UMass Minutemen and UMass Minutewomen basketball teams.
Lee’s father, Bernard Lee, is an accomplished poker pro with over $2.4 million in lifetime live tournament cashes, including two World Series of Poker Circuit (WSOPC) rings. He’s also a pickleball champion and runs an annual holiday charitable initiative to combat hunger in the Boston area.