Sam Panzica Triumphs at WPT Bay 101 Shooting Star

The $7,500 buy-in WPT Bay 101 Shooting Star Main Event was held at the Bay 101 cardroom in San Jose, with 806 players entering the competition to create a prize pool worth $5,722,600. Five days later, and it would be Sam Panzica who would eventually lift the title, as well as its $1,373,000 first place prize.
It was only last October that Panzica took down another WPT Main Event, on that occasion the $5,000 buy-in WPT bestbet Bounty Scramble for $354,335. Following his latest victory in California, which now boosts his career earnings to $3,317,702, Panzica commented:
“This one is definitely better. First place is four times as much as Jacksonville. But Jacksonville was cool though since it was my first one.”
The WPT Bay 101 Shooting Star attracted a number of notable pros, and amongst those seeing a return on their money was Blake Bohn in 67th ($15,300), Christian Harder in 34th ($26,220), Mike Sexton in 22nd ($30,590), Ravi Raghavan in 21st ($30,590), David Williams in 16th ($36,050), and Kevin MacPhee in 10th ($53,530).
The final table of nine was equally stacked with recognizable talent, with its largest stack being the 3-times WPT title winner Chino Rheem. The California pro subsequently proceeded to eliminate Rainer Kempe in 6th, followed by Dennis Stevermer in 5th, and Paul Volpe in 4th, before being sent to the rail himself by Anthony Spinella in 3rd.
As the final heads-up phase got started, Panzica held a roughly 3-to-1 chip lead over Spinella, and five hands later the deciding hand was played with a short stacked Spinella moving all-in preflop holding A-8. Panzica made the call with A-10, and after the dealer laid out a J-5-3-4-5 board, Anthony Spinella was awarded $786,610 for his hard-fought efforts, while Samuel Panzica collected his second career WPT title.
Final Table Results:
1: Samuel Panzica $1,373,000
2: Anthony Spinella $786,610
3: Chino Rheem $521,660
4: Paul Volpe $349,610
5: Dennis Stevermer $243,090
6: Rainer Kempe $188,460
7: Sergio Aido $144,760
8: Igor Yaroshevskyy $106,520
9: Stephen Graner $74,290