As 2025 turns into 2026, we are reflecting on some of the biggest stories of the year.
The race to be the World Series of Poker Circuit's all-time ring winner kicked into another gear this year as Ari Engel and Maurice Hawkins battled for the top spot, but a new player entered the chat late in 2025.
It started in earnest last year, when Ari Engel won a record 18th WSOP Circuit ring in an online tournament. This past March, Maurice Hawkins joined him at the top with his own 18th ring in a controversial finish to the Main Event at WSOPC Baltimore.
Engel, as he does, won another ring five days later in an online event in Pennsylvania, reclaiming the top spot. Hawkins would join him at 19 in April with a win in the $400 MonsterStack in Tunica.
Hawkins breaks the tie
The race would remain a stalemate until August, when Hawkins would add a 20th Circuit ring...and then a 21st just two days later.
Engel would return fire in September at Horseshoe Council Bluffs in Iowa, where he claimed Event #12 for ring #20.
Don't sleep on Lowery
Engel's victory moved him within one win of Hawkins, and some might feel that a logjam at the top is once again inevitable. But there are other WSOP Circuit crushers, and plenty of chances to win rings all over the country. Daniel Lowery, a prominent player on the mid-major scene throughout the US, has always lingered in the ring race while the top two got most of the attention. This October, however, he officially re-entered the chat.
Lowery, who won his very first WSOP Circuit ring in New Orleans, joined us at the Louisiana stop in August to talk about his life on the Circuit.
“I was really looking forward to winning one, and when I did, it was special because so many of my friends were on the rail,” Lowery told us about his first WSOP Circuit ring. “Back then, they used to announce the final table, and when they said my name, there were cheers across the room, and it made me feel really confident, which I think helped propel me to the ring.”
Lowery also told us about a conversation he once had with Engel when Hawkins was the runaway leader. That convo pushed Lowery to play more events.
“Ari and I had talked once upon a time and said one of us should be number one, and at the time we were both three or four rings behind Maurice. It's volume. if you play enough and get yourself in good positions, you are going to win a few, and [Ari and I] lit it up after that. That brought Maurice to another level.”
Elsewhere in the ring race, Josh Reichard is still hanging around with 16 and Mike Levin has 17, probably. Lowery calls Reichard "the best player on the Circuit," though you will find Reichard around less these days. If you ask any of the runners, Reichard would be the one that doesn't pay attention to it.
The calendar will now turn to 2026 and the WSOP Circuit will take on a new format. Gone will be the season split that ends with the WSOP. In its place a year-long battle for a spot in the WSOP Circuit Championship at Paradise in The Bahamas, where this year's ring winners will once again have punched their ticket to the Mystery Bounty event.
Stay tuned all year long and follow PokerOrg with live coverage of the WSOP Circuit at every stop in the USA.
