When Courtney "C.K." Kim hopped in the Women’s Event at WSOPC Cherokee in February of 2024, it was the first poker tournament of her life. Winning felt like a long shot, and she certainly didn’t envision that it would lead to a spot on the second season of NBC’s Deal or No Deal Island.
In a twist of fate, the long shot came in and Kim won the tournament for her first WSOPC ring — and a short post-win video with PokerOrg ended up in front of one of the show’s recruiters.
“One of the recruiters for Deal or No Deal Island saw it and reached out to ask if I wanted to interview for the show,” Kim told PokerOrg in an interview after the first episode aired on Tuesday night. “Honestly, I thought it was a prank at first.”
The call wasn’t a prank. Talks progressed from there and she was cast in the show's second season, airing throughout the first part of 2025. It was not exactly where Kim thought things would lead when she sat down for her first poker tournament.
A fast start
“A lot of people make fun of me. That’s the best and the worst way to start off. (Kim won a second ring two months later.) My grandfather played poker and he was a big poker player. He passed away a couple of years ago. I knew how to play poker, but I didn’t play it competitively. Over that next year, I studied and watched people play online and read a poker math book. I practiced for a year and kept it around me and studied as much as I could. I didn’t want to look like an idiot not knowing what I was doing.”
Kim is a banker in her other life, so preparation is foundational. Game shows are no different.
“It’s like my strategy with poker. I always want to be prepared. Unfortunately, I didn’t really study a lot of reality TV, and I probably should have watched more of that.”
Kim and the other contestants have been joined by David Genat, a Survivor: Australia champion, and Parvati Shallow, a Hall of Fame-level character from the American version.
“I never knew — none of us ever knew — that we were basically thrown in there with Phil Hellmuth and Daniel Negreanu.”
24/7 manipulation
“My strategy was to assess the situation. How can I study these people? Who is in charge? Who is clearly influencing others? Who can easily be influenced and how can I fit into this scenario? I think a lot of people go into a poker table and think, I have this big tournament I need to win. But really, you're just playing the people at your table. You gotta get chips and you gotta move on. It's the steps and phases of a tournament. It's a marathon, not a sprint.
The hardest part is the social aspect, and trying to manipulate each other is non-stop 24/7 from the time you wake up to the time you go to sleep.”
This is a fun ride, and she is going to stay on it, but Kim has no plans to ditch the banking profession for poker or game show playing for the time being — even though she won her second WSOPC ring a short time later at the stop in Elgin, Illinois.
“I always think of Vanessa Selbst, who is an amazing player, but also an amazing lawyer. She's very dedicated to that aspect of her job. But I’d love to leverage this somehow and play more. My favorite thing in the entire world to do is to compete for money.”
Watch Deal or No Deal Island on Tuesdays at 8/7c on NBC and the next day on Peacock.
Photos courtesy of Monty Brinton/NBC
