T.K. Miles Leads 81 Players into Day 4 of WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic

Dec 18, 2019

By Tim Duckworth

TK Miles

Day 3 of the Season XVIII WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic saw a total of 224 players return from the record-setting 1,035-entrant field to the Bellagio Resort & Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada.

With the prize pool and payout information released on Day 2, a total of 130 players would finish in the money with a guaranteed $18,530 min-cash. Reaching the WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic final table would earn the final six players a guaranteed $355,125 in prize money, while it would be the first-place prize of $1,694,995 that everyone would be chasing along with the title of champion that includes having their name engraved on the WPT Champions Cup.

Once cards were in the air, it would be a constant trickle of eliminations as players jostled for their place on the leaderboard. Defending champion Dylan Linde would lead the list of eliminations before the money was reached as the likes of previous champions Mohsin Charania, Joe Hachem, and Dan Smith, along with fellow WPT Champions Club members Harrison Gimbel, Tony Dunst, Noah Schwartz, Will Failla, Roger Teska, Ryan Riess, Scott Seiver, Taylor von Kriegenbergh, Justin Young, Taylor Paur, and Anthony Zinno all being eliminated just shy of the money.

After the Action Clock by Protection Poker was installed, the tournament was then on the money bubble, and after just one hand it would be Byron Kaverman losing a race holding ace-king to Roland Rokita’s pocket eights to leave the final 130 players $18,530 richer.

There would be two more levels in the day, and in the space of 90 minutes nearly 50 players would hit the rail as the likes of Justin Bonomo (130th), Shannon Shorr (127th), David Williams (124th), Mike Leah (123rd), Stephen Chidwick (122nd), Maria Ho (116th), Asher Conniff (115th), Matas Cimbolas (112th), Donald Maloney (102nd), Keven Stammen (95th), Matthew Wantman (84th), and Tyler Patterson (83rd) all found themselves short of a Day 4 berth.

A total of 81 players would bag chips to end Day 3, and leading those players was Day 2 chip leader T.K. Miles (pictured above) with 1,341,000 in chips. The Tallahassee, Florida native is a regular on the WPT with 14 main tour cashes, with his best finish coming in the Season XVII Borgata Poker Open. He finished runner-up for a career-best score of $383,399.

“We’re just getting started,” he said of taking the lead into Day 4. “It was pretty smooth. I won some, lost some, and won more than I lost. I won some big flips and just been fortunate so far. It wasn’t all falling in my lap as easy as yesterday, but I still won some big hands. I just play the game and try to make the right decisions.”

The only other players in the seven-figure club are WPT Champions Club member Jonathan Jaffe (1,244,00), WPT Champions Club member Eric Afriat (1,070,000), Alex Papazian (1,029,000), and Alex Foxen (1,020,000). Other WPT Champions Club members also surviving into Day 4 include Tony Sinishtaj, Seth Davies, Andrey Pateychuk, Darren Elias, Chino Rheem, Pat Lyons, Daniel Strelitz, Yevgeniy Timoshenko, Daniel Negreanu, Frank Stepuchin, and Jesse Sylvia.

Kevin Albers

With Maloney padding his lead in the Hublot WPT Player of the Year standings to now sit with 1,350 points ahead of Aaron Van Blarcum (1,275) and Geoffrey Hum (1,250). Unfortunately for Maloney, the winner of the WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic will collect 1,400 points for their finish. Kevin Albers (pictured above) finished the day with 882,000 and currently sits on 900 points following his third place finish in the WPT Borgata Poker Open, while Kitty Kuo (235,000) and Taylor Black (224,000) both sit on 500 points.

WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic Day 4 Seating Draw.

Day 4 of the WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic begins at 12 p.m. (PT) on Thursday with continuous live updates being provided by the World Poker Tour. Stay tuned right here to WPT.com for the exclusive live coverage of the tournament from start to finish to see who becomes the WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic champion, and wins his or her way to the season-ending WPT Tournament of Champions.

Photography by Joe Giron / PokerPhotoArchive


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