With nosebleed buy-ins, Triton Poker events might boast players from a very small and exclusive club, but there are always unique stories to be found.
The $30k PLO Bounty at Monte Carlo is a case in point: a final table that saw old-school legend Tom Dwan coming in with the chip lead, Danny Tang at his fifth final table of the series, and Gavin Andreanoff looking for only his second-ever lifetime tournament cash.
Dawn’s rapid demise
It didn’t take long for serious battle to commence, and a three-way pre-flop all-in saw Dylan Weisman triple up and half of Dwan’s stack disappear.
Weisman: A❤️K❤️8♠5♠
Dwan: K♣J♣9♠7♣
Tang: A♣A♦️️J♦️️2♦️️
Tang's aces and Dwan's top two were cracked when Weisman turned a flush, with the board playing out K♠J♠10♦️️Q♠5♣.
Dwan, super-combative as ever, rebuilt his stack, but his run finally ended when he defended his big blind with one of the “trashier hands,” as the commentary team described it. “No gamble, no future,” was the comment from Randy “Nanonoko” Lew when Dwan three-bet shoved with just top pair (kings) and not too much else, only to find Andreanoff with aces, an eventual nut flush sending Dwan out in seventh spot for a $69,500 cash, though he also raked in an impressive $120,000 in bounties.
The seven-minute tank
A “disgusting” runner-runner accounted for a bounty-less Onuchin in sixth, and then Daniel Dvoress followed him to the rail after tangling with Quan “Joe Tran” Zhou one time too many.
A 7-minute, conversation-laden tank saw Dvoress—only really in the hand because of the $40k bounty on short-stack Laszlo Bujtas’s head—eventually call off his tournament life on the 4❤️2❤️3♠K♠5♣ board.
Dvoress had two-pair with Q❤️J❤️5♠4♦️️ but he was crushed by Zhou, who rivered a straight with A♠K♣7♠6♦️️.
That allowed Bujtas, with only 3BBs, to ladder up to fourth, and then Danny Tang’s hopes of a second Triton Poker Monte Carlo title were dashed when Zhou hit a backdoor flush.
Rollercoaster battle for the title
Heads-up was an incredible affair between Zhou and Andreanoff, the latter with only one tournament cash to his name, a $115,000 sixth-place finish in the $25k PLO at the Triton SHR London stop in August of this year.
He certainly proved he has game, though, matching the experienced Chinese pro blow-for-blow, bluff-for-bluff, and recovering from a 5-1 chip deficit to eventually take down the title and $387,000 top prize.
The final hand reflected the entire heads-up battle.
Zhou: Q♦️️Q♠10♠6♠
Andreanoff: A♠10♦️️7♦️️3♣
Zhou raised 3x from the button from a stack of almost five million against the Englishman’s 9.1 million, eliciting a call from Andreanoff. The flop came down A♣K❤️3♦️️ before Zhou c-bet 800k into 2.8 million, again getting a call from Andreenoff with top and bottom.
“An action turn card” was how Henry Kilbane described the J♦️️, giving Zhou the nut straight, who then bet 1.3 into the 4.4 million pot and again received a call.
The 2♦️️ was a brutal river card for Zhou, who proceeded to throw in his last 4BBs only to get an insta-call and the bad news.
That gave the Englishman his maiden Triton Poker victory, with the PLO cash game aficionado revealing his route to success afterwards: “Basically getting good cards in the right spots! In that format, with the ante, it can go either way. It was all over the place.”
Andreanoff added, “It’s sick. It’s super hard. You obviously want the bounties but you want to get yourself in the spot to get in the top places too.”
Triton Monte Carlo $30k PLO Bounty results
| Place | Player | Prize |
| 1 | Gavin Andreanoff | $387,000 (+ $160k bounties) |
| 2 | Quan Zhou | $269,000 (+ $120k bounties) |
| 3 | Danny Tang | $178,000 (+ $120k bounties) |
| 4 | Laszlo Bujtas | $139,000 (+ $160k bounties) |
| 5 | Dan Dvoress | $112,400 (+ $40k bounties) |
| 6 | Iakov Onuchin | $87,000 |
| 7 | Tom Dwan | $69,500 (+ $120k bounties) |
| 8 | Dylan Weisman | $54,000 (+ $40k bounties) |
Photos by Joe Giron/Triton Poker
