Rick Ziegler Won thbet game apke 2025 Eastern Poker Open For $10,000

Table Of Contents

• The $34,000 Championship Final Table Results
• Final Table Action

On Sunday, Day 1 survivors joined monthly qualifiers, regional winners, and wild cards to battle for the 2025 Eastern Poker Open $34,000 Championship title. There were 291 hopefuls on Saturday’s opening flights, and only 16 of them advanced to the finale.

They were joined by dozens of others, and all told 90 players battled on Day 2. After 12 hours of play, it was 61-year-old Rick Ziegler out of Stoughton, Massachusetts claiming the title and $10,000 first-place prize.

Ziegler, who picked up the game during the “Poker Boom” after Chris Moneymaker’s win (Fun Fact: Ziegler was down in Aruba back in December for the Moneymaker Tour), is a regular in local charity events and in the Eastern Poker Tour bar league, which he started playing in 2007. He qualified for the Eastern Poker Tour by playing the latter and finishing in the top eight on a monthly leaderboard.

An investment systems analyst and father of two, Ziegler is slated to celebrate his granddaughter's graduation and to take her on a cruise this summer before she heads off to college. His new five-figure score will no doubt go a long way in making it even sweeter!

The $34,000 Championship Final Table Results

Among those to cash but fall short of the final table were Chris Nichol (10th - $500), Jim Gardner (11th - $300), Gerald McKinney (12th - $300), Glenda Ricci (13th - $300), Maria Swift (14th - $200), Tom Walsh (15th - $200), and Al Mercier (16th - $100) & John Foley (17th - $100), who busted at the same time on the bubble and split the first payout.

Final Table Action

The final table proved to be a quick affair, starting when Shaun White busted with ace-ten to the pocket tens of Ziegler. John Germano, who back in December bested a 396-player field to win the 2024 Bar Poker Open Florida World Championship for $30K, then lost a flip with pocket sixes to the ace-king of Slade Edmonds.

Minutes later, Linda Rodrigues, the last woman in the field, bowed out when her pocket jacks fell to John Rebollo’s rivered set of fours. The short-stacked Rick Stickles followed her out the door in fifth place, and then Chris Alex busted after flopping top pair but with an inferior kicker to Ziegler.

Three-handed play lasted a good bit with players taking turns doubling through each other, but eventually, Edmonds three-bet jammed with ace-deuce only to get snapped off by Ziegler’s pocket eights, which held.

After that, it was a short heads-up battle as Ziegler began with a more than 2:1 chip lead over Rebollo. In what would be the final hand of the tournament, Rebollo got his stack in after flopping bottom pair but couldn’t overcome Ziegler’s middle pair.

Congratulations, Rick Ziegler on becoming the 2025 Eastern Poker Open champion!

Many players from the Eastern Poker Open will no doubt head to Las Vegas this summer for the 2025 Bar Poker Open Vegas World Championship at the Golden Nugget from Sunday, June 8 through Friday, June 13, 2025. PokerNewswill also be there to provide live updates.