Katchalov has over $6.4 million in tournament winnings

Eugene Katchalov has a way of sneaking up on people. His ability to lay low and strike when his opponent is least expecting it is part of the reason why he is a multi-million dollar winner and uniformly revered by his peers, even though he may not be a household name to poker fans.

Now TV audiences will get a little more familiar with the 29 year-old pro thanks to his big win in the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure (PCA) Super High Roller event, which will air later this year on ESPN2. Katchalov defeated an incredibly tough final table that included the likes of Daniel Negreanu and Katchalov’s best friend, Nick Schulman, who came into the start of final table play as the chip leader.

The final table took just two hands to lose a player. Short-stack Andrew “luckychewy” Lichtenberger shoved over the top of a raise from Negreanu, only to run his AT into Negreanu’s pocket kings. Lichtenberger hit the rail in seventh place and the remaining players were officially on the money bubble.

The unfortunate bubble boy was Hungarian entrepreneur Sandor Demjan. The last amateur standing shoved in on an 882 flop with TT and Katchalov called with JJ. Demjan failed to improve and he was the last player to walk away from the final table without a payout. Minutes later, Humberto Brenes exited in fifth place when he lost an all-in preflop coinflip against Bryn Kenney.

With four remaining, Schulman began to falter. Negreanu took a big pot off Schulman when he turned a set of fours against Schulman’s top pair of aces to take the chip lead and slipped even further down the counts when Negreanu called him with ace-high a few hands later and his high card was good enough to take the pot.

Schulman attempted to bluff Negreanu a while later when they went heads-up to a flop of JT3. Schulman check-raised the flop and bet out when the 7 hit on the turn. Negreanu called and the two saw the river come 3. Schulman moved all-in for just over a million chips and Negreanu thought for some time before calling with AQ for a queen-high flush. Schulman showed K9 for just ace-high and headed out in fourth place.

That pot gave Negreanu a substantial chip lead, but Katchalov evened things up by busting Kenney in third place. Kenney ran pocket eights into Katchalov’s pocket queens and the action was down to heads-up. Even though the tournament wasn’t over, Negreanu had already locked up an important record. With a guaranteed payday of $1 million, Negreanu surpassed Phil Ivey on the all-time money earners list with $14.1 million in lifetime tournament earnings.

The heads-up battle went on for quite a while, even though Katchalov jumped out to an early lead. Negreanu managed to double up on two separate occasions to stay in contention. Even with the double-ups, Negreanu had a tough time picking up chips, but managed to avoid disaster by miraculously flat calling a big river bet from Katchalov. Negreanu had the nut straight on an 85466 board, but Katchalov had him bested with quad sixes.

In the end, Negreanu was running short on chips and shoved all-in with 55. Katchalov called with 44 and he did not improve after an AT8 flop. The 4 on the turn was just the card Katchalov was looking for, though it did give Negreanu a spade flush draw. The river brought the 2 and Katchalov took the pot and the match, while Negreanu had to settle for a $1 million payday and a new poker record.

Katchalov, meanwhile, earned $1.5 million for the win, bringing his lifetime earnings to over $6 million. Known for his tricky play and low-key demeanor, Katchalov admitted he thinks this tournament was suited to his strengths.

“I do feel like I like excel [in big buy-in tournaments],” he explains. “ There are a lot of mind games and it gets very, very interesting. There’s just a lot to it. I definitely enjoy playing against good players. Even though it is tough, I enjoy it.”

While some players knew they would be taking part in this big buy-in event as soon as it was announced, Katchalov needed a little convincing before putting up the buy-in, even though he only had 50% of himself in the event.

“I was always thinking it would be a good tournament, because it is PokerStars. I thought it would get a pretty good field and I was considering playing it. Approaching the tournament, I wanted to see how I did in some live tournaments and how I was doing in general to see what my money situation was…The funny thing was, whenever I come to the Bahamas, I always stay at the Cove [resort]. I heard the Cove was sold out, but I also heard that if you buy into this tournament you get four free nights at the Cove and that put me over the edge (laughs).”

Now, Katchalov has one night’s rest in his luxury Cove room before he gets back to work, as he plans on taking part in the $10,000 buy-in Main Event tomorrow afternoon.

Here are the results from the $100,000 buy-in Super High Roller event:

1st: Eugene Katchalov – $1,500,000
2nd: Daniel Negreanu – $1,000,000
3rd: Bryn Kenney – $643,000
4th: Nick Schulman – $400,000
5th: Humberto Brenes – $200,000

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