Petrangelo Wins Final Two Stairway to Millions Events

Written by Jennifer Newell

Last updated on January 24th, 2022

Affiliate Disclaimer Please note that some links on Legal US Poker Sites are affiliate links. We may receive a commission, at no extra cost to you, if you click through our links and make a purchase from one of our partners.

The list of players who are usually able to complete in events on the PokerGO Tour is limited. With tournaments beginning at $10K and increasing exponentially, few players are able to justify those buy-ins, making the competitors and winners an elite group of poker players. For something new, PokerGO wanted to change that. That brought about the Stairway to Millions.

The inaugural Stairway to Millions was the second stop on the 2022 PokerGO Tour Presented by Guaranteed Rate. There were eight tournaments in total, and they started with a $1K buy-in, not exactly the high stakes to which PokerGO followers have become accustomed. The “stairway” gave players the opportunity to move up with each subsequent tournament and into the $100K buy-in finale. The concept was new and attracted enough players to easily blow past the prize pool guarantees.

Events 1-4

The first of the eight events offered the cheapest buy-in and, of course, attracted the most players. And from the 190 entries, only 28 players cashed, including names like Brad Owen and Chance Kornuth. Daniel Sepiol went into Day 2 fourth in chips of the six players. He started strong, though, by eliminating a shorter stack. He then busted the fifth-place and fourth-place finishers before sending Joseph Cheong home in third place. Sepiol had the lead going into heads-up and won the tournament on the second hand of that match.

 

Event 2 doubled the buy-in but remained affordable for many players. And out of the 129 entries, the top 19 finishers were paid. Sepiol didn’t make the money in this event, meaning his stairway didn’t go very far. That left several pros in the mix to battle for the title. Although Chance Kornuth started fourth in chips, he worked his way directly to the winner’s circle.

 

Kornuth stayed strong going to the next tournament. Despite a very late registration, he beasted his way through the field and took a sizeable lead to the final table. And he won his second STM event in a row.

 

Event 4 brought just a few tables into play, As the money bubble neared later on Day 1, Michael Lang busted in eighth place and Shannon Shorr followed in seventh. High-stakes regular Chris Brewer took the lead into the final table, though Salim Admon wasn’t far behind. On the final day, though, Brewer ended up finishing in third, and Admon won the title.

 

Bigger Buy-in Events 5-8

At the point that the buy-ins started at $15K, the fields diminished significantly. There were only 43 entries in Event 5. The final seven were paid, and after David Coleman busted in seventh place, Michael Wang took the chip lead to the final table. And Wang went on to win it on January 17.

 

Michael Wang hoped for some luck in the next event, but he busted several places before the money, courtesy of Ali Imsirovic. But Imsirovic busted in ninth place, followed by David Coleman, Michael Lang, and Chris Brewer. Jake Schindler busted Vikenty Shegal in fifth place on the bubble, and Schindler took the chip lead to the final day. And he turned that into victory.

 

The $50K buy-in had only 21 entries registered, which meant the top three would be paid. Players started the tournament with 150K chips, and Nick Petrangelo started strong. The high-stakes regular chipped up and eliminated Stephen Chidwick, but he lost a big hand to Koon and Chidwick. That left him with half of his starting stack. A bit later, Alex Foxen doubled through him, leaving Petrangelo with 9K. He tripled that, doubled through Koon twice.

Petrangelo kept building momentum by ousting Jake Schindler in eighth place and then Bill Klein and Sean Perry in one hand. He played four-handed with an almost consistent lead, though he was second of the final three in the money when Anuj Agarwal busted in fourth place. He went on to win the event the following day.

 

The final event of this series delivered 19 entries and three paid places. Nick Petrangelo was one of the early chip leaders and kept climbing to lead the final table of nine players with a two-to-one lead over David Peters in second on the leaderboard. Petrangelo busted Ali Imsirovic, took a big pot from Peters, busted Bill Klein in sixth and Alex Foxen in fourth.

With a two-to-one lead over Sean Perry and nearly six-to-one over David Peters, Petrangelo dominated going into the final table of three. It took two hours to finish it. In the first hour, Peters doubled through Petrangelo. Peters lost a lot of ground again, though, down to 200K chips at one point. He doubled through Perry once and started evening the stacks all around at the one-hour mark. Peters continued his roller coaster, getting short and then doubling through Petrangelo, that time to take the overall lead. He took even more by bluffing a big pot from Petrangelo.

Nearly two hours into play, it was Petrangelo’s turn to dominate. He doubled through Perry, leaving the latter with just 100K chips. Peters then busted Perry and took a slight lead into heads-up. Petrangelo chipped up rather quickly. Only a few hands in, Peters limped with pocket sixes, and Petrangelo raised with A-T of clubs. Peters responded by moving all-in, and Petrangelo called to see two clubs on the flop and another on the river for the flush and the win.

 

Nick Petrangelo crushed the inaugural Stairway to Millions and closed it out by defeating @dpeterspoker17 heads-up in the $100k!

Petrangelo took home nearly $1.8 million for four days of work and is now the early 2022 PokerGO Tour leader!

Read more here:https://t.co/DE6fvSai3E pic.twitter.com/xcL8LGkL55

— PokerGO (@PokerGO) January 21, 2022

Updated POY

This Stairway to Millions series changed everything and put Petrangelo at the top of the 2022 PokerGO Tour leaderboard.

 

What’s Next for High Rollers?

There will be a quick trip to Florida this week for a Super High Roller event but then back to Las Vegas for quite a lot of events in February. After that, many high rollers will head to Russia.