Three cold hands kick off the Borgata Summer Poker Open.

The Borgata Summer Poker Open, sponsored by BetMGM Poker, featured a guaranteed prize pool of $600 in the opening event. Day 1 saw a massive three-way cold pot, with Anthony Andino taking the chip lead with a straight.

The World Series of Poker may have brought another summer to a close, but the schedule for live tournaments hasn't slowed down.

The Borgata Summer Poker Open, sponsored by BetMGM Poker, officially kicked off today in Atlantic City. The opening group of the $600 Deepstack Opening Event (guaranteed prize of $1,000,000) attracted many players to the Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa.

As one of the key events in the tournament schedule, the Deepstack Opening Event has seen a significant upgrade this year, with the guaranteed prize money jumping from $600,000 in 2025 to $1,000,000 this year. The six starting groups will begin successively before Saturday, with surviving players returning to the second day of the tournament on Sunday.

The atmosphere on the field quickly heated up.

Andino gained an early chip lead

The tournament was only halfway through Level 3 when Anthony Andino became the key player in the biggest pot of the day, winning a pot of nearly three starting stacks in a three-way cold hand.

Andino went all-in on the river, facing a player in an earlier position and Jason Blank in the hijack position. The board was 9♠8♠6♦K♣10♦, and there were already 85,100 chips in the pot.

The player in the earlier position showed 9♦9♣, a set on the flop; Blank showed K♠10♠, forming top two pair with an unfulfilled flush draw. However, neither hand was strong enough.

Andino flipped out 7♠7♣, making a 10-high straight on the river, winning the huge pot and taking the early chip lead.

The player holding three of a kind won a small pot of 3,800 chips, but immediately in the next hand, he went all-in from the gun position without looking.

Blank had about 30,000 chips left after the previous hand. He isolated with A♦K♥ against A♣8♦ and hit K pair on the flop, eliminating his opponent and recovering some of his losses.

Want to participate in the competition? There are multiple qualifying pathways.

Players wishing to participate in the Borgata Summer Poker Open do not need to buy in directly. BetMGM Poker is hosting online qualifiers throughout the series, with satellite tournaments starting at just $10.

Online offerings include the $50 satellite tournaments, which qualify players for the Deepstack Opening, Pot-Limit Omaha Championship, Borgata Almighty Stack, and Monster Mirror mystery bounty tournaments. Winners will receive both a tournament seat and $50 in cash. Players chasing the $2,700 Summer Poker Open tournament can also utilize the $250 qualifiers, with winners receiving a tournament seat plus $500 in cash.

Throughout the festival, the Borgata Poker Room also hosted numerous live satellite tournaments, including direct tournament qualifiers and multi-event suite satellites.

New BetMGM Poker players can also enjoy a 100% first deposit bonus, up to $1,000, plus tournament tickets up to $75, giving players more opportunities to win entry to the biggest summer tournaments for less than the full amount.

Borgata Summer Open Full Schedule

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