Hall of Fame for a reason: Patrik Antonius crushes Day 2 of Triton $200K

On Friday, 73 remaining competitors returned for Day 2 action in Event #8: $200,000 NLH Triton Invitational at the Triton Super High Roller Series in Monte Carlo. With late registration officially closed, the final tally of entries stood at 102 (80 unique), generating a total prize pool of $20,400,000. 

While 17 players would go on to collect the $320,000 minimum cash, only one will eventually stand atop the podium to collect the $5,130,000 top prize. 

Linus Loeliger began proceedings with the chip lead – thanks in part to a massive win with pocket aces against Leon Sturm’s pocket kings the previous day – and continued his accumulation of chips throughout Day 2 to make it into the money. Loeliger’s momentum stalled out, however, towards the end of Day 2 play and he fell short of the final table. Sturm, meanwhile, exited early on Day 2, finishing in 29th place. 

Playing on his home turf, Patrik Antonius proved yet again how worthy he was to be the 2024 Poker Hall of Fame inductee. After taking command of the chip lead midway through the day, the Finn continued to add to his stack as play approached the money before doing the heavy lifting himself in eliminating the bubble boy. Antonius continued to acquire chips, despite a few hiccups along the way, as play slowed before the final table. After bursting the money bubble earlier in the day, Antonius did the dirty work once again to take the remaining nine players into the final table. 

Close but no cigar for Haxton and Ponakovs

There were a number of notable names eliminated outside of the money, including Adrian Mateos, Phil Ivey, Stephen Chidwick, and Fedor Holz. On the soft bubble, Isaac Haxton took a stand against Roman Hrabec in a blind versus blind situation and moved all-in with . Hrabec made a quick call with to put Haxton at risk of elimination. The flop narrowed Haxton’s path to victory considerably and the turn confirmed his elimination in 19th place. 

Almost immediately afterwards, Antonius and Aleksejs Ponakovs squared off in an all-in confrontation of their own. Ponakovs was the player at risk of elimination and needed to improve on the runout. Antonius held a slight equity advantage with his pocket pair, but Ponakovs had plenty of ways to make the best hand once the flop came down. 

Antonius:
Ponakovs:
Flop:

Patrik Antonius burst the bubble, adding a massive infusion of chips to his stack in the process.

With over 4,000,000 chips in the middle and the direct money bubble on the line, Ponakovs needed to make his flush to stay alive. The turn changed nothing for either player and the river improved Antonius to a full house to burst the money bubble. 

Antonius lays brutal beat on Brewer

With the money bubble behind them, players fell by the wayside in quick succession. Ferdinand Putra, Wai Kin Yong, Nick Petrangelo, Brian Kim, and Chris Brewer all made their exits. Brewer, as usual, put his chips in the middle with the best of it preflop in a potential chip-lead pot. In brutal fashion, however his fell to Antonius’ . 

The two players were all-in after Brewer five-bet jammed his superior holding and Antonius, having already put in nearly half of his opponent’s stack, called it off. The flop paired Antonius out of nowhere, but Brewer was drawing live with his flush draw and over card. On the turn, Brewer picked up added outs in the form of a gutshot straight draw and the river improved his hand, but not enough to win the pot. 

Patrik Antonius downed Chris Brewer in brutal fashion after the two players got all the chips in the middle preflop.

It wasn’t all smooth sailing for Antonius as he ran into Mikita Badziakouski’s  and failed to improve across the runout. With plenty of chips to spare, however, Antonius was undeterred. Saya Ono, the last woman standing in the field, bowed out in 11th place after moving all-in from the cutoff with only to see Vladimir Korzinin call behind her with . With only three immediate outs to the winner, Ono needed a favorable runout, but the board offered her no improvement. 

Antonius delivers final table 

The final elimination of the day came at the hands of none other than Antonius as he downed Turkey’s Sinan Unlu to take the remaining players to the final table. On a stack of less than ten big blinds, Unlu committed his chips with from the big blind following Antonius’ button raise with . The Finn made the call and continued his heater on the flop. Unlu drew dead on the turn , but the deck supplied the needling on the river to add insult to injury. 

Tomorrow, the nine remaining players will convene to play down to a winner at the final table. With $5,130,000 on the line for the eventual winner, each player has their eyes on the top spot. 

Event #8: $200,000 Triton Invitational Final Table