Event #31: $500 NLH Summer Saver of the 2021 WSOP Online Series on WSOP.com is in the books with Brad ‘1badcajun’ Zusman taking it down to earn his first gold bracelet and $79,683. This was Zusman’s first recorded tournament win and his largest score. His previous top cash came when he finished ITM in the 2019 WSOP $10K main event, earning $17,135 as the 941st-place finisher.
Zusman had a roller coaster ride on the final table. He began with the second biggest stack at the table and came down to below ten big blinds at a point before eventually bouncing back to the top. He eventually outlasted Mark ‘victb’ Ioli (runner-up for $49,270) in the heads-up to claim the title.
The heads-up began with both players holding stacks of over 40 big blinds. It seemed like a long heads up battle but the decisive hand came only 15 minutes after the heads-up began. On the final hand, Ioli raised to 480,000 and Zusman re-raised to 1,245,000. Ioli finally moved all-in for 7,944,932 holding Qh Qs and Zusman called with Ah Jh. The flop As 5d 3h made Zusman a 88% favorite. Ioli needed a queen but the turn 3d and the river 2c were of no help, ending his run in the second place.
The $500 entry buy-in event drew an impressive 917 entries, collecting a prize pool of $412,650.
Puneeth “kimisraunchy” Modha money-bubbled the tournament in 144th place. Recent bracelet winner Sang “youngkoi” Lee (13th for $3,466), Joseph “biueberry” Cheong (33rd for $1,857), bracelet winner Jim ‘BOCARATONE’ Collopy (37th for $1,568), Jeff “NedrudRelyt” Madsen (82nd for $867), and Kathy “Luckygal” Liebert (132nd for $701) were among the big names to cash in this tournament.
Final Table Payouts (USD)
- Brad “1badcajun” Zusman – $79,683
- Mark “victb” Ioli – $49,270
- Josh “YoelRomero” King – $34,704
- Jeff “bortzork” Miller – $24,759
- Jason “TheBigGift” Gooch – $17,909
- Orson “borgatcha” Young – $13,122
- KerriP – $9,780
- Jeremy “g00sebumps” Menard – $7,386
- David “dave419” Nodes – $5,653