Breaking Down the Biggest 2025 WSOP Hands – Part 6

Event #71 – $10k Limit 2-7 Triple Draw Championship

California casino owner Alex Wilkinson has spent more than 30 years chasing the poker dream of one day winning a WSOP bracelet.  He’s been close – cashing 20 times and making 8 final tables but the top of the podium has eluded him – until now. 

Wilkinson took down Event #71, netting him a career best $333k by beating 140 others in the Limit 2-7 Triple Draw Championship, and taking out some big names in the process, including Nick Schulman and Yuri Dzivielevski. 

Let’s look back at a tough hand Wilkinson was involved with that got him heads-up for his first WSOP bracelet.

In level 25 with limits of 100k and 200k, Schulman sat with roughly 800k while Wilkinson had around 3.5 million. Draw one saw Schulman draw two and Wilkinson taking one, with Wilkinson betting. Draw two saw Schulman take one and Wilkinson stating pat, but Wilkinson’s bet here got check-raised by Schulman, which did not deter Wilkinson who called. Draw three saw both stand pat, and Schulman bet, putting him all in.  Wilkinson looked him up.

We don’t know exactly what cards Schulman started with, but one must assume that he made the decision to commit his stack on the first draw – otherwise we can’t imagine Schulman going for it without a foundation.  The interesting part though was Wilkinson only drawing one card – we recognize that Schulman was short stacked, but when you have 4 big bets and a WSOP bracelet on the line, you must be aware of what your opponent is doing and ask is this the right moment to go? 

Schulman thought so despite check-raising into an opponent standing pat, and who was undeterred from the bet. Seeing both hands at the end, your heart breaks for Schulman – two hands at the top of the chart playing three-handed for a bracelet is a literal cooler and a tough one to take for Nick who bowed out in 3^rd place winning $144k but missing out on another bracelet.

Event #72 – $10k Super Turbo No-Limit Hold’em

In a world of multi-day tournaments, WSOP single day marathons do still exist. These are super turbo events that are action packed from the shuffle up and deal call to the final hand, and this year Reiner Kempe needed 15 hours to polish off the 808 other players and win the title and $892k in the process. 

In the hand we’ll look at, the second and third place players played a fascinating hand deep into the tournament, minutes before Kempe knocked both out.

We jump to level 38 with blinds at 600k and 1.2 million and a 1.2 million ante. Kempe is sitting with 21.7 million on the button, while Yuya Arito is in the small blind with 18.8 million and Ryuta Nakai is left with around 7 million in the big blind. Pre-flop, Rempe folded; Arito raised to 2 million and Nakai defended. On the flop, Arito fired 1.5 million again, with Nakai calling. 

The turn brought no action before the river saw Arito shove and Nakai call after taking some time to determine his decision.

Given how shallow everyone was at the start of the hand – the chip leader had only 21 big blinds, while the other two were below 20 big blinds, it seems like a tough spot to try and pull off a two-barrel bluff, but Arito was fearless in his pursuit of the pot here. Nakai clearly had a solid read on Arito when he called the flop bet – having a pair three-handed is strong, but when you are playing for so much money in a turbo event like this, calling pre-flop and post flop effectively commits you with the stack he had behind. 

When the turn saw Arito check, you must consider if this was a tell or not – was Arito setting him up for a river bluff or was Arito concerned that he was beat with the flop call? 

When the board paired and the river bricked, Arito decided to go for it, that Nakai had the seven and wouldn’t call a shove, or that Nakai missed and Arito could steal it without going to showdown. This is a horrible spot to be – passive play that gets you to a river decision for your tournament life three-handed at a WSOP final table. 

To Nakai’s credit, he made the correct call but we have to think that the turbo nature of this tournament added to the call for Nakai who took his sweet time making the call. Unfortunately for him, it wouldn’t result in a pay jump as minutes later he got coolered Ace-Queen to Kempe’s Ace-King.

Event #74 – $10k Pot-Limit Omaha Championship

Literally down to less than one big blind, Michael Wang took 2/3 of a big blind and went on the heater of his life. He had the second biggest stack by the end of the night, winning the bracelet and just shy of $1.4 million. To do it, he he beat a field of 873 other hopefuls and many of poker’s biggest stars. 

In winning the bracelet, Wang had to contend with Michael Zulker heads-up, and we look at a hand where Wang had laid the trap but was disappointed in the result.

Level 35 with blinds at 300k and 600k with a 600k ante, we find Zulker on the button with 19.5 million and Wang in the big blind with 32.9 million. Zulker raised to 2.1 million with Wang calling and check-calling a 1.4 million c-bet from Zulker. The turn saw no action and sadly for Wang, neither did the river as Zulker checked it to showdown and mucked his hand.

When you are chip leading heads-up and your opponent raises into pre-flop, and you hit top two on the flop and turn a boat, you are praying that your opponent has enough to continue betting and handing more chips over to you. 

Wang played the hand passively as he did everything in his power to keep Zulker betting but the American realized something was up on the turn and slowed down. Wang’s check on the turn might actually have saved Zulker from betting the river. After all, top two heads-up with no straight or flush draw is a tough hand to lose with.

I’m sure Zulker was tempted to bet thinking he was good, but recognizing that Wang easily could have had a King – and the turn check may have shown this – Zulker lost the minimum, only pushing 6 big blinds to Wang and leaving him with a playable stack.

Event #76 – $2,500 Big Bet

Aaron Kupin denied Daniel Negreanu a chance at another bracelet as he took town the $2,500 Big Bet Event #76 at this year’s series, winning $206k. 

He entered the final day as the top stack and used that to his advantage, being Marco Johnson heads-up for the bracelet, but in his path to victory Kid Poker stuck his tournament life on the line with about as many outs as one can have when behind that Kupin had to fade to take out one of the fan favorites.

We pick things up in level 28 playing Pot-Limit Omaha with blinds at 40k and 80k with a 120k ante. Negreanu starts the hand with 2.4 million in the big blind, and Kupin sat in the small blind with approximately 7.3 million.

Pre-flop saw Kupin check the option to Kid Poker who opted to see a flop that induced a 145k bet from Kupin, and a raise up to 900k from Negreanu, which got called. 

On the turn, Kupin shoved on Negreanu who called and gambled for his tournament life.  The result speaks for itself.

In what can only be described as having too many outs, Negreanu had so many outs that he mathematically was a slight favorite going to the river – about 52% to 48% for Kupin. Still, with the money already in the pot this was an easy call for Negreanu to make, and while two pairs in pot-limit Omaha can be a precarious position to be in, four handed Kupin was not going anywhere in this hand, especially with a chance to jump the money ladder and knock out one of the toughest pros at the table.

The interesting angle to this hand was the raise from Negreanu on the flop and the call from Kupin. If you analyze this from a distance and consider both hands at this point, Negreanu is the favorite to win – call it 60/40 – because he has so many cards to hit that take the lead – any four, six, seven, eight or jack get him either trips or a straight. With the size of the pot at that moment – 425k – Negreanu’s raise almost makes it incorrect to call from a math perspective – his pot equity is only 38.5% but needing 57% to make the call be profitable. 

That’s hard to wrap your head around but this is the roller coaster ride you get in PLO – you have top two on the flop, and you are an underdog from what the math says. Kupin didn’t think he was behind, fired off, and saw Negreanu’s equity go down despite picking up outs – and unfortunately for Daniel, all those outs failed to hit, and he exited in fourth place.

Event #81 – $10,000 Main Event

We’re going to save a future article for a hand review on the big hands from the Main Event but wanted to add this in now as a small teaser and a reminder that anything can happen in the main, as Lauren Hazelgreen found out 45 minutes into Day 1.

She sat with Ace-Jack of Spades and ended up getting into bloated pot that was three-bet by Pedro Garagnani, holding pocket tens. 

Pre-flop, the pot was already over 10k, and when it came Jack-Ten-Four, disaster was spelled for Hazelgreen, who bet another 6500, which saw Garagnani check-raise up to 23k.  Hazelgreen shoved, and was called immediately by Garagnani, who watched the turn and river were bricks, sealing her fate as the first eliminated on day 1 of the main.

More to come as we continue to re-visit this year’s series and get ready for a deeper dive into the Main Event!

Read more:

• Biggest 2025 WSOP Hands – Part 1
• Biggest 2025 WSOP Hands – Part 2
• Biggest 2025 WSOP Hands – Part 3
• Biggest 2025 WSOP Hands – Part 4
• Biggest 2025 WSOP Hands – Part 5