Eric Afriat Wins Final $15,100 Event At 2024 U.S. Poker Open

Eric Afriat has added a PokerGO Tour title to his long list of poker accomplishments. The three-time World Poker Tour main event champion from Canada bested a field of 64 entries in event no. 7 at the 2024 U.S. Poker Open, earning $288,000 for the win.

This was the 13th six-figure score on Afriat’s resume, bringing his career earnings total to more than $5.3 million.

Afriat also finished as the runner-up in the kickoff event of this festival. With 378 PGT points and $377,900 accumulated across those two cashes, he is now the second-ranked player in the USPO points race with just one event yet to finish. He also climbed to 22nd on the season-long PGT leaderboard and 50th in the Card Player Player of the Year race standings after this victory.

This event played out over the course of two days inside the PokerGO Studio at ARIA Resort & Casino Las Vegas. The top 10 finishers earned a share of the $960,000 prize pool, with David Peters (10th), Victoria Livschitz (9th), Brock Wilson (8th), and Darren Elias (7th) busting inside the money late on day 1.

Two-time POY award winner Stephen Chidwick began the final day in the lead, with Afriat sitting in the middle of the pack when cards got back in the air. Chidwick remained atop the chip counts even after Bill Klein (6th – $52,800) and Sean Winter (5th – $72,000) were sent packing.

Afriat doubled through Chidwick during early four-handed action, with a rivered flush besting a rivered straight. That knocked Chidwick out of the top spot, but he soon eliminated Sam Laskowitz in fourth place ($96,000) to move back in front. Chidwick shoved the river with trips and Laskowitz hero called with ace high. This was the fourth cash of the series for Laskowitz, bringing his total haul to $353,710.

Afriat ramped up the aggression during short-handed play, and was able to take the lead and then pull away from the rest of the pack. Chidwick was whittled down to around seven big blinds by the time his final hand arose. He called all-in from the big blind with K-8 facing a small blind shove from Joey Weissman, who held 9-6. Chidwick flopped trip eights to take a big lead, but Weissman picked up a gutshot straight draw that came in on the river to send Chidwick to the rail with $129,600. He now has more than $57.2 million in career earnings after this latest deep run.

Heads-up play began with Afriat up 5,860,000 to 2,140,000. It didn’t take too long for Afriat to convert his chip advantage into the title. In the final hand of the tournament he min-raised to 160,000 on the button with KJ and Weissman three-bet to 400,000 with AQ. Afriat called and the flop came down Q108. Weissman bet 220,000 and Afriat called. The A on the turn saw Weissman check with his aces and queens. Afriat moved all-in with his newly-found straight and Weissman called for around 500,000. The 10 on the river locked up the pot and the title for Afriat.

Weissman earned $187,200 as the runner-up. This was the third cash of the USPO for the bracelet winner, with $344,550 earned so far at this festival.

Here is a look at the payouts and rankings points awarded at the final table:

Photo credits: PokerGO / Antonio Abrego.