Prahlad Friedman Wins WPT Legends of Poker Main Event

Published on August 27th, 2009 10:38 am EST

Prahlad Friedman successfully navigated through a field of nearly 300 players to take down the 2009 WPT Legends of Poker main event last night.

For his victory, Friedman took home $1.009 million dollars, as well as a $25k entry to the WPT Championship.

Kevin Schaffel ended up finishing in second place for $471,670. If this name rings a bell to you, it's because Schaffel is a member of the "November Nine" - not a bad run for Schaffel at all.

Prahlad Friedman entered heads up play with a sizable chip lead (6.6 million to 1.85 million), and Schaffel was never able to recover. Schaffel was able to double up and make it close, but Friedman closed the deal a short while later.

The final hand came down when Schaffel decided to push all-in over the top of a Friedman re-raise pre-flop.

Friedman had a tough decision to make, as he would have been crippled if he had lost the pot.

After contemplating for a few seconds, Friedman made the call, showing A-Q offsuit.

Schaffel turned up K-J offsuit and would need to improve to stay alive.

The board ran out 10c-3h-2h-4d-9d, and Friedman took down the tournament with just Ace high.

This is the second major victory of Friedman's career. At the 2003 World Series of Poker, Prahlad took down the $1,500 Pot Limit Hold'em event for his first and only WSOP bracelet.

With this victory, Friedman now has over $2.3 million dollars in lifetime tournament cashes. He is also now one of the few players who have been able to win both a WPT title and WSOP bracelet.

Here is how the final table finished out:

1. Prahlad Friedman, $1,034,500
2. Kevin Schaffel, $471,670
3. Todd Terry, $231,300
4. Toto Leonidas, $144,600
5. Sam Stein, $116,225
6. Mike Krescanko, $89,220

In honor of Friedman's victory, here is "Poker is Fun" (performed by the man himself):



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Filed Under: Tournament Results