Jose Montes Outlasts Huge Field to Win HPT Black Hawk

Jose Montes Outlasts Huge Field to Win HPT Black Hawk Golden Gates Casino in Black Hawk, Colorado, hosted one of the biggest Heartland Poker Tour events to date. Total of 761 entrants paid their buy-in to compete for what turned out to be $240,523 first place money. When it was all said and done, Jose Montes, a poker player from The Bronx was one holding all the chips and the accompanying prize.

We win #unreal#HPTBlackhawk
— Jose Montes (suganills) February 24, 2015

Montes’ heads-up opponent was a player well known to many poker fans. Joe Serock put up a serious fight and the final confrontation lasted for hours. Eventually, however, Serock couldn’t outlast Montes and had to be satisfied with the second place finish, worth $148,895.

2nd place, got pillaged hu, was sleep deprived/headache, played like poo. Really sucks only winning 145k for 3 days of work.
— Joe Serock (@floesknows) February 24, 2015

The first player to leave the final table was Travis Northrope, who was eliminated after somewhat controversial situation as the cards were flipped face up before all the chips were in the middle. It happened due to a wrong announcement by the tournament director and the rest of the chips found its way into the middle. Five cards later Northrope was sent to the rail with $20,919 for his efforts.

He was followed to the rail by Craig Casino. A man known as ‘The Legend’ is the biggest money earner in the HPT tournaments, and his eight place finish adds further $26,000 to his winnings. Danny Gonzales fell next, taking home $31,211.

Kane Lai made the first deep run of his career but couldn’t go further than sixth place which was good for $37,811. Fifth place went to Jacob Bazley who, unlike Lai, has had a fair share of experience with the deep runs and this was his third HTP final table appearance. For his efforts, Bazley took home $49,211.

The last two men standing apart from the final two were Alex Yen and James Bryan. Yen was the first to fall when his draw failed to materialize against Serock’s set and he was sent home $67,456 richer. As for Bryan, he will be happy about his third place finish, since he was able to turn his $380 initial investment into the score of $97,458.

The winner, Jose Montes, was quite excited about the outcome. The victory in such a big field and very respectable first place money are certainly nothing to frown upon, as he took home just shy of quarter of a million US dollars!

Photo: HPTPoker.com