After three days of stiff competition, a USOP Vietnam Main Event winner was finally announced! The crowd went wild in the Crown Poker Club as local player Đại Ngọc Nguyễn, defeated Benjamin Sai from Singapore in the final match of the U Series Poker Vietnam Main Event. This win marked him as the official champion of the main event, after three days of nonstop competition.
While this accomplishment was impressive on its own, it has special significance for Nguyễn. For the past four years, he has worked to win an official U Series poker championship title. Now he has finally reached the dream and won one of the festival’s most important events.
The USOP Vietnam Main Event Tournament
By the time the main event started, only 9 players were left out of the hundreds who signed up. These players came from all over the world for a chance to win the main event title as well as the huge cash prize.
- Evgenii Chernyi
- Phat Thanh Nguyen
- Sua Shung Er
- Calvin Tan
- Benson
- Benjamin Sai
- Minku Kim
- Dai Ngoc Nguyen
- Thuy Trung Duong
Nguyễn was the 8th player to secure a slot after he defeated fellow Vietnamese player, Lordrich Nguyen in the Day 2 Main Event. Lordrich had previously won another tournament, the Deepstack, and was aiming to score two titles in USOP Vietnam before losing to Nguyễn.
However, while Nguyễn was successful in advancing in the competition, he still faced many challenges. Among the 9 players, Đại was in the middle of the back with 3,720,000 chips and 48 Big Blinds, putting him in fourth place for both. Meanwhile, the front-runner Evgenii Chernyi had more than 11,190,000 and 140 Big Blinds, giving him a huge lead over Nguyễn.
Despite these challenges, Nguyễn continued to play hard and outsmart his competitors to become the USOP Main Event winner. Thanks to years of experience, he has managed to reach the top two players along with Singaporean poker star, Benjamin Sai.
The last hand of the game came down to luck and skill for Nguyễn. By that time, he had a slight lead with chips and held Ace of Spades and 7 of Clubs. Meanwhile, Sai only had the Ace of Clubs 10 of Diamonds. As the community cards had the 8 of Spades, the King of Spaces, 3 of Spades, 5 of Spades, and the 5 of Diamonds. This revelation gave Nguyễn the chance to get flush and allowed him to become the Main Event Winner.
Prizes for Đại Ngọc Nguyễn
Among the things that Nguyễn received as the Main Event winner was the USOP Main Event trophy and a massive cash prize of VN₫ 3,550,000,000 (equal to US$ 151,100). This is the biggest payout he ever received in his career. But instead of keeping this money to himself, as a display of generosity, Nguyễn divided part of his winnings into “lucky money” to share his good fortune with others. He distributed this lucky money to everyone.
After being crowned the newest Main Event winner Nguyễn said.
“I am very happy. It’s my first big Main Event title. I was tested mentally and physically and I overcame a big field of 870 entries. I am extremely happy. I can’t even think of how I will celebrate because I am just so happy.”
Đại Ngọc Nguyễn, USOP Vientam Main Event Winner
Although Nguyễn is now officially the winner, the other competitors had their own interesting success stories that allowed them to reach the top 9.
To know more about who were these other competitors, check out our update page on the Top 9 Main Event Players.