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PokerStars acquires its former competitor Full Tilt Poker. PokerStars agrees to pay back the US customers who remained in the limbo after the DoJ shut down Full Tilt Poker operations, which totals around $184 million. PokerStars manages to salvage the brand’s assets and also pay back outstanding player debts. Play PokerStars On-The-Go. Amazing free mobile poker apps available now. Poker anytime, anywhere - Play a full range of games on the PokerStars app - directly on your device! Watch your favourite poker TV shows for free - download the PokerStars TV app and catch full-length TV shows, interviews and more. Halfway through the ninth hour, only 11 players remained as K0VAK eliminated Poeira4 in 12th place and looked to better a sixth place finish in the Warm-Up last year. Three hands later Volpe helped his own drive for another title after knocking out shortstacked Vitaliy275 in 11th place ($3,753.75) bringing up hand-for-hand play. K0VAK gone in 5th ($6,800.81) K0VAK made it 52,550 from UTG and met an instant 3-bet from ilir3 in the cut-off to his left. When it folded back to him, he shoved for 528,073 total and got a quick call. K0VAK's 5♥ 5♣ were far behind the Q♥ Q♦ of ilir3, but the flop brought some hope.

Tonight's $500,000 guarantee Sunday Warm-Up featured someone who been there before and looked to get there again. Paul 'paulgees81' Volpe has collected plenty of victories at PokerStars and nearly pulled off another Sunday Major win. Instead BankOfNorway proved to be mightier after knocking out Volpe in fourth place en route to a victory over a field of 3,003 for $94,294.85.

Paul 'paulgees81' Volpe would head into the final two tables holding a shorter stack but looking to add another major victory tonight. After collecting a WCOOP bracelet a few weeks ago in Event #63 Volpe is now one TCOOP victory away from completing the PokerStars Grand Slam. But, unlike his WCOOP victory, he would not have a massive stack to work with in the late goings of this tournament.

Super Tuesday and MicroMillions champ zen_mec would pick up $1,951.95 in 18th place ten minutes before the ninth hourly break. BankOfNorway would relish the chip lead holding over five million chips with an average stack around 1.5 million and the blinds at 40K/80K ante 8K as the players enjoyed a five minute respite.

The chip leader went to work early in the ninth hour knocking out paulitschMC in 17th place while dragging in the 2.7 million chip pot as Volpe managed a little run good to stay alive. With the blinds at 40K/80K ante 8K Volpe would open raise from the small blind as Saraiva8 three-bet all-in covering the rest of Volpe's stack. Paul would make the call with 5♠8♠ as Saraiva8 showed K♣J♥. Despite flopping top pair, Saraiva8 did not survive the river 6♥2♥J♠4♣7♥ as Volpe collected the 1.3 million chip pot, staying alive for the $94K sitting up top.

Halfway through the ninth hour, only 11 players remained as K0VAK eliminated Poeira4 in 12th place and looked to better a sixth place finish in the Warm-Up last year. Three hands later Volpe helped his own drive for another title after knocking out shortstacked Vitaliy275 in 11th place ($3,753.75) bringing up hand-for-hand play.

15 minutes before the tenth hourly break FaZeHigh would try to pick off the blinds with a shove for 1.95 million from the small blind holding K♥7♠. But, jusc covered and had the goods A♥T♥ to make the call. A king would flop, but the turned nut straight 2♣K♦J♠Q♣8♠ would send FaZeHigh away in tenth place starting up the final table below:

Seat 1: sinergio (670650 in chips)
Seat 2: Giffan (2028182 in chips)
Seat 3: icenigel (1981502 in chips)
Seat 4: K0VAK (4612693 in chips)
Seat 5: giabest (1666920 in chips)
Seat 6: vonchamier87 (2189171 in chips)
Seat 7: paulgees81 (1635500 in chips)
Seat 8: jusc (6705150 in chips)
Seat 9: BankOfNorway (8540232 in chips)

Ice'd

The final table would start out as haves and have nots as BankOfNorway and jusc both claimed sizable stacks, K0VAC holding nearly five million, while no one else held more than 2.2 million. On the second hand back from the tenth hourly break with the blinds at 100K/200K ante 20K icenigel would open shove for 1.24 million from the button as giabest was happy to call from the big blind with pocket kings K♥K♦. icenigel's J♠8♠ would turn a flush draw but could not connect A♣5♠Q♦A♠9♥ taking home $4,804.80 in ninth place.

New favorite hand for Volpe?

Overcoming dominating hands is usually necessary to outlast a field of over three thousand players. Volpe managed to channel his luck at the right time at the final table while eliminating two players on back-to-back hands. With the blinds still at 100K/200K ante 20K Paul would raise to 414,555 from UTG as singergio called in middle position for almost all of the Greek's chips as the rest of the table folded. After the K♦2♥4♣ flop Volpe set sinergio all-in for the remaining 37,345 chips while flipping up a pair of fours 4♥A♦. The four was enough to overcome sinergio's queen kicker Q♠A♥ as the J♣ turn and 9♠ river failed to help, earning sinergio $7,807.80 in eighth place.

On the next hand vonchamier87 would open shove for 929,171 from the small blind as Volpe made the call from the big blind hoping to work some magic with ace-four again 4♥A♠. He would need it against vonchamier87's seven kicker A♥7♦. The four did not flop, instead it waited for the turn K♥8♦Q♥4♠T♦ to eliminate vonchamier87 in seventh place ($13,813.80).

Second best

As the blinds moved up to 125K/250K ante 25K, shortstacked giabest would shove 1.38 million chips from the cutoff and Giffan took a look at A♣T♠ in the big blind. Sitting on only two million chips Giffan decided to take a shot and made the call flipping against giabest's pocket eights 8♠8♥. The outcome would wait until the clichéd ace on the river 7♣K♣2♦4♣A♠ as giabest took away $19,819.80 in sixth place.

Blown away

Just six hands later in the same blind level Giffan, fresh off taking out giabest, would sit on the hot seat this time. jusc min-raise from the cutoff as Giffan would shove 2.12 million from the small blind holding K♥8♥. jusc with over 10 million in chips had the ability to gamble and decided to do so with K♦J♣. The jack-kicker made the difference as the all-low 5♥3♦4♠3♣7♣ board ended Giffan's night in fifth place ($25,825.80).

Cashing out

Volpe's run towards adding a Sunday Warm-Up title to his list of accomplishments here at PokerStars will need to wait at least until next week. With the blinds up to 150K/300K ante 30K BankOfNorway's once mighty stack was shot down to 4.84 million but big enough to command attention after shoving from the button with J♣A♦. Volpe holding pocket eights 8♠8♦ and covering by 117,520 chips in the big blind decided to make the call. Unfortunately it did not work out for the WCOOP, SCOOP, and Sunday Million champ as a jack flopped K♥5♠J♠2♣7♦ leaving him with under a small blind. Volpe would fight back but BankOfNorway would claim his remaining chips five hands later earning Volpe $34,534.50 in fourth place.

Just the two of us

As the blinds moved up to 200K/400K ante 40K jusc would min-raise from the button as K0VAK shoved from the big blind for a little over six million chips. Holding ace-ten T♣A♣ jusc would make the call and pleased after K0VAK turned up the dominated A♠8♠. Any chance of overturning the domination dissipated after a ten hit the flop A♦3♦T♠J♦8♥ ending K0VAK's tournament in third place ($49,861.81).

I'll just take it all

As the final two players took to the 11th hourly break Team Online's Roy Bhasin would step in to assist with their interest in a deal. Well, the interest was heavily weighed by BankOfNorway's 19 million to 10.9 million chip lead as the chip leader demanded a sizable amount of the remaining funds not knowing that $10K needed to be set aside for the winner.

After the busted chop talks jusc would take down a 7.7 million chip pot bringing the chip counts much closer as BankOfNorway's lead was trimmed to 15.1 million to 14.8 million. Four hands later with the blinds holding at 200K/400K ante 40K BankOfNorway would retain the chip lead and min-raise from the button as jusc three-bet to 1.8 million. BankOfNorway would shove as jusc had a decision to make with Q♣A♠. The lady was strong enough to make the call but not sturdy enough to overcome BankOfNorway's big slick K♠A♣ as the nine-high 5♦6♠3♠9♥8♣ board shipped the Sunday Warm-Up title and $94,294.85 to BankOfNorway!

PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up results (10-12-14):

Entrants: 3,003
Places paid: 432
Prize pool: $600,600.00

1. BankOfNorway (Norway) $94,294.85
2. jusc (Lithuania) $70,270.20
3. K0VAK (Bulgaria) $49,861.81
4. Paul 'paulgees81' Volpe (Canada) $34,534.50
5. Giffan (Denmark) $25,825.80
6. giabest (United Kingdom) $19,819.80
7. vonchamier87 (Germany) $13,813.80
8. sinergio (Greece) $7,807.80
9. icenigel (Czech Republic) $4,804.80

David Aydt is a freelance contributor

Lots of limping. Plenty of aggressive stealing. Fields full of players who have limited experience. Hold on, have we travelled back in a poker time machine?

Nope - if anything, we're looking at the future. You see, Event 12-M of the Spring Championship of Online Poker was a No Limit Hold'em Ante Up tourney - which remains one of the more modern online poker formats that has also found popularity on the live tournament circuit. The structure of these events maintain the same fixed-blind level throughout - entirely changing the pre-flop positions that poker players perceive as standard. It's not the blinds that increase, but the antes - and every player is accountable for one of those each hand.

The medium-tier was an $82 buy-in with a $75K Guarantee slapped on the prize pool. Well, by the time registration was over that amount had almost doubled to $143,175. A total of 1,909 players entered on Day 1 but only 252 would make a profit, and a few of the names in the lobby were hardly surprising to see. The UK's Charlie 'JIZOINT' Combes was crowned the 'Ante Up King' after winning his second SCOOP title in the Ante Up format in 2013 (the first came in 2011). Unfortunately for Combes, who has more than $5,000,000 in online tournament winnings, he couldn't grasp his third title in this event, after busting relatively early. Other previous SCOOP Ante Up champs who left this tournament before the money included 2014's high-tier winner Ash 'DYBYDX' Mason and last year's winner in this event, piper_kl88.

PokerStars Asia Pro Naoya 'nKeyno' Kihara was the only member of the red spade club to cash (85th - $250.55), whilst other Team PokerStars Pros not faring as well included George Danzer, Jason Mercier (chasing his third SCOOP title of 2015), and Chris Moneymaker.

Day 2

Just 21 players returned to battle on the virtual event on Day 2, and leading the way was Canada's ilir3. Another player doing well was tournament beast Paul 'paulgees81' Volpe, a SCOOP and WCOOP champ and yet another member of the $5,000,000 club in terms of online success. Lower in chip stacks but ahead of Volpe by around $1M in online winnings was Bryan 'theczar19' Piccioli, who was looking to go one better than his 2nd place finish in the high-tier Ante Up event at SCOOP 2012 (for $36,140) by getting the win and the title. Meanwhile, Hungary's Tóth 'SlyderS1' Béla was chasing his second SCOOP title (the first came in 2013 for $169,758).

Of course, there were only nine spots at the final table. Volpe couldn't quite make it, busting out in 12th place for $1,116.76. Two eliminations later and we had our nine.

Final table chip counts

Seat 1: VzB_Poker (Brazil) -- 857,519
Seat 2: LuckboxStami (Finland) -- 150,213
Seat 3: SsicK_OnE (Germany) -- 1,825,386
Seat 4: K0VAK (Bulgaria) -- 446,593
Seat 5: ilir3 (Canada) -- 1,868,530
Seat 6: GangstaZab (Russia) -- 1,393,467
Seat 7: theczar19 (Mexico) -- 1,729,354
Seat 8: KissP4ckUSee (Malta) -- 484,637
Seat 9: AlcateL00 (United Kingdom) -- 789,301

The start-of-day chip leader, ilir3, had maintained that lead going into the final table. Also, could Bryan 'theczar19' Piccioli pick up his first SCOOP title after coming so close in the past? We waited to find out.

LuckboxStami eliminated in 9th place ($1,431.75)

It didn't take long for our first elimination. Blinds were insignificant at this point (just 5/5) but the ante was 10,000. In this hand, LuckboxStami was in the 'big blind' position, and SsicK_One made it 10 from UTG. It was called around to AlcateL00 on the button who made it 48,775 to go. LuckboxStami, who had just 120,203, raised all-in and everyone else got out of the way before AlcateL00 called.

AlcateL00: A♥K♦
LuckboxStami: 8♣A♣

The player all-in was just a 30% favourite and would need a lot of help to survive. The flop fell 2♠J♠T♦ and it wasn't the dark suit LuckboxStami was hoping to see. The K♣ turn meant that the only card that could change anything would be a queen for a chop. Instead, it was the 2♦ and we were down to eight players.

KissP4ckUSee out in 8th ($2,505.56)

Just 7 hands later we had another knockout. With a couple of callers, ilir3 made it 51,234 to go from middle position. theczar19, who by this point was chipleader with more than 2M, called from the cut-off, before KissP4ckUSee shoved for 374,612 on the button. ilir3 made the call and theczar19 folded so we were heads up.

KissP4ckUSee: Q♥K♦
ilir3: T♣T♠

It was an old fashioned race, and the flop was intiguing. The 9♣J♦7♠ meant that KissP4ckUSee could now not only go ahead with a king or queen, but one of the remaining 2 tens as well. However, the 8♦ turn all but ended it giving ilir3 a straight, and when the river was the K♣ it was too little too late.

VzB_Poker eliminated in 7th place ($3,865.72)

The next one to fall was the player in Brazil. A min-raise from ilir to 10 saw everyone limp around to VzB_Poker on the button, who shoved huge for 588,869 with the ante at 12,500. SsicK_OnE re-raised all-in from the small blind and everyone folded.

It was A♣J♥ for the initial raiser against the A♥K♥ of SsicK_OnE. There was never much sign of hope for VzB_Poker as the board ran out 9♦5♠8♥5♥Q♥, giving Ssick_OnE the nut flush and sending the player in Brazil to the rail.

GangstaZab's aggression backfires; out in 6th ($5,297.47)

Having seen two limpers in front of him, GangstaZab raised to 45,000 - 3 times the 15,000 ante - from the button with a stack of just over 1M behind. Chipleader theczar19 to his left made it 211,940 to go and it was folded back to the initial raiser. After some time spent in the time bank, GangstaZab 4-bet shoved for 1,073,075 total and it was quickly called.

GangstaZab: 9♣8♣
theczar19: {qh]A♦

The aggression hadn't paid of for the Russian, who need a nice run out to survive. Instead, it was just about the worst flop - 2♥A♥2♠ - and the 5♥ turn and 6♣ river didn't change anything either. We were down to 5.

K0VAK gone in 5th ($6,800.81)

K0VAK made it 52,550 from UTG and met an instant 3-bet from ilir3 in the cut-off to his left. When it folded back to him, he shoved for 528,073 total and got a quick call.

K0VAK's 5♥5♣ were far behind the Q♥Q♦ of ilir3, but the flop brought some hope. It was 2♥A♠3♥ and a four or five would be enough to take the lead. The J♣ arrived on the turn changing nothing, and K0VAK couldn't get there on fifth street either; the T♣ the card that would see him out in 5th.

By this point, theczar19 was the big chipleader.

It would take quite some time before another player's tournament life would come to an end, and in that time theczar19 extended his lead even further, bringing his stack over the 6,000,000 mark.

AlcateL00 eliminated in 4th place ($9,413.75)

With 608,645 and the ante at 30,000, the short stack AlcateL00 made it 104,755 on the button. Both Ssick_OnE and ilir3 folded but theczar19 decided it was time to play for it all. AlcateL00 made the call and was well ahead with A♠Q♥ against A♦5♦.

The lead didn't last long though. The 5♥K♣K♦ was a cruel one and put theczar19 out in front. When the T♠ landed on fourth street it meant that he needed a queen or jack to win and a ten to chop, but the 4♥ was a blank and that was all she wrote for AlcateL00 - out in 4th place.

The chip counts after several orbits three-handed looked like this:

theczar19: 6,587,720
SsicK_OnE: 1,491,316
ilir3: 1,465,964

But, as we all know, closing out a tournament against tough competition is by no means easy, regardless of chip advantages. The two shorter stacks picked their spots and built their stacks up, before Ssick_OnE doubled through theczar19 when his pocket kings held against A♣Q♣. With the ante now at 50,000, the stacks were pretty similar: SsicK_OnE had around 3.5M, ilir3 had around 3M and theczar19 too had around the 3M mark. However, there were no talks of a chop.

ilir3 eliminated in 3rd place ($12,885.75)

The chipleader coming into Day 2 and the final table, ilir3, had seen his stack get short after a few big hands, one of which saw him bet all three streets heads up with theczar19 only to fold to a river shove. With the ante now 70,000 he was down to just 497,627 and shoved all in on the button, which was called by theczar19. Despite being behind with the J♣9♣ against A♣7♥, ilir3 was still going to win the hand 45.9% of the time. However, neither hand improved on the K♠8♦6♠3♣6♦ board and we were finally heads up.

Heads up chip counts

SsicK_OnE: 6,444,651
theczar19: 3,100,349

theczar19 eliminated in 2nd place ($17,181); SsicK_OnE wins for $22,909.24

After around an hour of heads up play, SsicK_OnE had a taken a demanding lead with around 8M to theczar19's 2M. Having got lucky to double up just a few hands prior, theczar19 shoved all in for 2,475,958 after SsicK_OnE had made it 98,240 from the button (antes at 100,000). It was snap called and it was K♠K♥ for SsicK_OnE against the 8♥Q♠ of theczar19. He'd need a lot of help to avoid another SCOOP 2nd place finish, and he didn't get any. The board ran out 5♦J♥6♣3♦A♥ and we had our winner in Event 12-M. Congratulations to all the players who made the final table!

SCOOP-12-M: $82 NL Holdem [Ante Up] - $75K Gtd
Entrants: 1,909
Prize Pool: $143,175
Places Paid: 252

1. SsicK_OnE (Germany) -- $$22,909.24
2. theczar19 (Mexico) -- $17,181
3. ilir3 (Canada) -- $12,885.75
4. AlcateL00 (United Kingdom) -- $9,413.75
5. K0VAK (Bulgaria) -- $6,800.81
6. GangstaZab (Russia) -- $5,297.47
7. VzB_Poker (Brazil) -- $3,865.72
8. KissP4ckUSee (Malta) -- $2,505.56
9. LuckboxStami (Finland) -- $1,431.75

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The Spring Championship of Online Poker is the biggest and richest tournament festival of the year, with millions in prize money to be won, a packed schedule, and separate buy-in levels designed to suit all bankrolls.

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A total prize pool of $40 million is guaranteed with the series running right through until May 24th. Head to the SCOOP home page for more details.

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Jack Stanton is a journalist and freelance contributor to PokerStars Blog.