Following the great success of the inaugural SCOOP League, which played out during the 2024 Spring Championship of Online Poker, PokerStars launched the first-ever WCOOP League as part of this year’s World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP).
The WCOOP League is a unique concept where six PokerStars Ambassadors pick a team of five players each, including the top ranked players in this year’s WCOOP Boot Camp, which played out in preparation for the biggest online tournament series of the year.
The WCOOP League draft was completed a few days ago, just in time for the start of WCOOP, with Lex Veldhuis, Parker Talbot, Sebastian Huber, Andre Akkari, Fintan Hand, and Benjamin Spragg each drafting their own fantasy teams for the League.
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A few days into WCOOP, Team Peace&Loove captained by Sebastian Huber is in the lead with 1000 points, while Team Easywithaces and Team Akkari follow in second and third.
As the League goes on, you can take advantage by heading over to the sportsbook section in the PokerStars app and placing a bet of at least $5 on who you think will win the 2024 WCOOP League.
If your team does win, you will get a chance to play for one of 125 valuable prizes, including a $10,300 Power Path Gold Pass and plenty of other valuable rewards, making it a bet well worth placing.
PokerStars Captains Draft Their Teams
The WCOOP League started out with a draft, in which six PokerStars Ambassadors picked their own teams of five players each, compared to the ten players in each team during the SCOOP League.
The rules of the draft indicated that each Ambassador had to pick one PokerStars Team Pro member, as well as one player from the top six performers in the WCOOP Boot Camp. The other three players could be picked at random from the entire pool of PokerStars players.
All players except Andre Akkari picked themselves as the PokerStars Team Pro, as he chose Laurie “LaliTournier” Tournier instead.
Plenty of other well-known tournament pros made the draft, including the likes of Benny Glaser, Niklas “Lena900” Astedt, Patrick Leonard, Adrian Mateos, Daniel Smiljkovic, and others.
Here is a look at the full draft results and the teams competing in this year’s WCOOP League:
| Team Veldhuis | Team Tonkaaaa | Team Peace&Loove | Team AAkkari | _.Team Easywithaces | Team Spraggy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lex Veldhuis | Parker “tonkaaaa” Talbot | Sebastian “peace&love” Huber | Laurie “LaliTournier” Tournier | Fintan “easywithaces” Hand | Benjamin “Spraggy” Spragg |
| Denis “aDrENalin710” Strebkov | Niklas “Lena900” Astedt | Fal1st | Yuri “theNERDguy” Dzivielevski | Patrick “Pads1161” Leonard | Kelvin “kelvin_fp:ar” Kerber |
| Benny “RunGodlike” Glaser | Jerry “PerryMejsen” Odeen | Thiago “tgrigoletti” Grigoletti | Felipe “lipe piv” Boianovsky | Renan “Internett930” Bruschi | Simon “C. Darwin2” Mattsson |
| Roman “RomeOpro” Romanovsky | ShipitFTW911 | Lasse “Wistern” Jagd Lauritsen | Pedro “PadiLhA SP” Padilha | Adrian “Amadi17” Mateos | Daniel “SmilleThHero” Smiljkovic |
| Farrokh674 | Zidix | King153246 | FollowTheBreath | So00oSick | Revenge4Dodo |
How You Can Get Involved
The 2024 WCOOP League may be a competition reserved for the titans of the game, but there is an opportunity in there for the rest of us as well.
In order to get involved, all you need to do is place a bet on the team you prefer to win worth at least $5 in PokerStars Sports.
If your team wins, you will receive a ticket for the WCOOP League Freeroll, where prizes worth thousands of dollars will be given away at the end of WCOOP.
If you want to guarantee a seat in the Freeroll, you can place a small bet on every team in the League, or simply choose your favorites and hope for the best.
In either case, players who do get their tickets will get to play for a prize pool that includes the following prizes:
- 1st Place: $10,300 Power Path Gold Pass
- 2nd Place: $2,500 Power Path Silver Pass
- 3rd Place: $530 NAPT Las Vegas Satellite Ticket
- 4th — 9th Place: $109 Power Path Bronze Pass
- 10th — 18th Place: $55 NAPT Las Vegas Satellite Ticket
- 19th — 75th Place: $11 Power Path Step 3 Ticket
- 76th — 125th Place: $5.50 NAPT Las Vegas Satellite Ticket
With a chance to win a Power Path Gold Pass, this Freeroll is a chance you should not pass up on, and a small bet of $5 in PokerStars Sports is all it takes to give you a chance.
Sebastian Huber’s Team Takes Early Lead
With just a few days gone by, it is Team Peace&Loove led by Sebastian Huber that holds the first place with 1000 points ahead of Team Easywithaces with 925 and Team Akkari with 865 points.
Huber owes his early lead to FAL1st and WCOOP Boot Camp qualifier king153246, who accumulated 335 and 320 points, respectively, making up a big portion of their team’s 1000 points.
Team Akkari, on the other hand, has already amassed 495 points thanks to the efforts of Yuri Dzivilievski, one of the top tournament poker players in the world, whose early WCOOP performances have been awe-inspiring.
So far, only Lex Veldhuis and Jerry Odeen have captured WCOOP titles, but those were interestingly not enough to put their respective teams in the top three spots on the leaderboard.
The WCOOP has only just begun, and there are three more weeks of non-stop tournament action to go, which means the eventual outcome of WCOOP League is still up in the air.
Place the bets on your favorite WCOOP League team, rail your favorite players throughout the series, and qualify for the WCOOP League Freeroll where you could win your way to one of the major PokerStars live events including the NAPT Las Vegas.