Eight Deuce · Tournament #21

Lee Ugarte Starts the New Season Exactly Like the Old One

Five wins in eight tournaments now — and Angela Cain’s best night in the league.

Sixteen players opened the third season and Lee Ugarte won it, which is now the ordinary result. Five knockouts, four hours and thirty-seven minutes, a heads-up match that lasted four and a half minutes, and $430.

It is his fifth win in eight tournaments going back to April, his sixth in this league and the fourteenth of his career. He took the Player of the Year in October by a hundred and twelve points and has begun the defense the same way.

Josh Reel was second for $295, his third runner-up finish in the last twelve months. Angela Cain took third and $205 — her best result in nineteen Eight Deuce tournaments, having never finished higher than fourth before — and Shawn Miller was fourth for $150 with three knockouts.

Where the money went

The undercard

Eric Denny bubbled in fifth. Rick Mickaliger came sixth, his best finish here.

Jeff Holderman finished sixteenth of sixteen. He has not cashed in an Eight Deuce tournament since August 2021 — ten of them ago — and he was the Player of the Year the season before that.

The bigger picture

Sixteen entries and three rebuys made $1,080, a healthy opening after a season that fell away to ten-player nights in the late summer.

The format is unchanged: ten tournaments, and the Player of the Year counts each player’s best eight scores. Lee starts on 95.00.

Eight Deuce #21 — Friday, January 13, 2023. 16 entrants, 3 rebuys, four paid from a $1,080 prize pool. First tournament of the 2023 season; Player of the Year counts each player’s best eight scores.