Alex Greenblatt Wins HPT Golden Gates for $180k

Alex Greenblatt Wins HPT Golden Gates for $180kLatest stop on the Heartland Poker Tour was the Golden Gates Casino & Poker Parlour in Black Hawk, Colorado, with 542 players entering its $1,650 Main Event last Wednesday to create a prize pool of $796,740. On Monday, a champion was then crowned with Alexander Greenblatt successfully managing to navigate his way atop the field to collect the title, and a first place prize of $179,274.
This year, Greenblatt made a deep run at the WSOP $10,000 Main Event, eventually finishing in 65th place for a $101,444 payday. While the pro has had two other cashes higher than that amount, worth $112,200 and $145,898, his latest victory represents a new career high, whilst pushing his lifetime earnings to $1,055,787.
The HPT Golden Gates offered 63 money places, and amongst the pros seeing a return on their buy-ins was David Gutfreund in 37th ($3,665), Kevin Eyster in 32nd ($4,382), Joshua Turner in 16th ($7,011), and Ryan Van Sanford in 15th ($9,163).
Alex Greenblatt then entered the final table in pole position, but Kevin Boudreau soon put himself in contention after flopping a set holding pocket fours against the aces of Ben Greenberg, who subsequently ht the rail in 9th. Boudreau followed up by eliminating Evan Ross in 8th, and by the time just four players remained it was Boudreau who was sitting on the biggest stack.
However, Boudreau’s position started to diminish, before plummeting further after pushing all-in holding Ks-9s against Greenblatt’s As-Jc on a Qs-8s-6s flop, only for a 3s to hit on the river. Boudreau exited soon after in 4th, and after Livingston (K-Q) took care of Fernando Galvan (A-A) in 3rd, heads-up play between Greenblatt and Livingston got underway for the title.
At this stage, Greenblatt was at a 2-1 disadvantage, but soon managed to redress the balance in an A-9 versus A-J encounter with the board then rolling out K-A-9-4-x. Greenblatt subsequently finished off Livingston  a few hands later holding A-9 to his opponent’s A-6 to secure his impressive win.
Final Table Results:
1: Alex Greenblatt $179,274
2: Matt Livingston $110,747
3: Fernando Galvan $72,583
4: Kevin Boudreau $50,434
5: Izzy Garcia $36,650
6: Danny Gonzales $28,440
7: Bobby Garcia $23,902
8: Evan Ross $19,919
9: Ben Greenberg $15,935


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