Another installment of the North American Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP) has come to a close, and it ended up being even bigger and better than the operator had anticipated.
The festival lasted 18 days and attracted 142,907 total entries across hundreds of events in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Ontario.
The festivals offered a combined guaranteed prize pool of $7,000,000, but ended up creating prize pools worth $8,100,000, easily shattering the guarantee and offering plenty of value for everyone involved.
The $8.1 million in prize money was spread across events in three buyin orbits, as is traditional for PokerStars festivals, with Low, Medium, and High version of every event offering all players a chance to play within their price range.
In the end, the highest guarantees were achieved by the nine Main Events, which ran across all the markets on the penultimate day of this year’s SCOOP, as thousands of players took to the virtual felt in pursuit of the most valuable titles.
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SCOOP Over Performs in All North American Markets
The PokerStars SCOOP was a massive success in all North American markets, as the operator managed to shatter the guaranteed prize pool in each of the three markets it ran in.
Due to regulation and licenses, the operator was only able to combine liquidity across PokerStars NJ and PokerStars MI, while PokerStars PA players and PokerStars ON players could only play against players in their fenced markets.
This resulted in three simultaneous North American SCOOP series running at the same time, each of them with a preset guaranteed prize pool that was blown out of the water.
In the shared liquidity market of NJ and MI, PokerStars accumulated a grand total of $3.4 million in prize money, some $400k over the guaranteed $3 million. The operator performed similarly in Pennsylvania, where the guaranteed $2.3 million prize pool turned into $2.7 million in real prizes paid out.
Over in Canada, PokerStars ON saw players create a total prize pool of $1.9 million, some $200k over the guaranteed $2.7 million, also showing the interest in online poker events is quite high in Canada’s most-populous province.
Ontario’s series actually performed the highest above expectations, given the fact PokerStars increased the guaranteed prize pool for it by CAD $500k compared to last year, and it still managed to shatter this new number.
Of the Ontario guarantee, CAD $200,00 was reserved for the Main Event, which ended up attracting 458 entries and surpassing the guarantee just slightly, as the champions’ title and over $34k in prize money went to “sicilianu_6,” making him the winner of the biggest online poker event ever played in Ontario.
PokerStars Awards $74k Worth of SCOOP Tickets
As is usually the case with major tournament series like SCOOP, PokerStars ran a host of qualifier tournaments and promotions that allowed players to take part in the festival without having the pay the full buyins.
Among these, the operator ran depositor’s freerolls, Spin & Go tournaments, and Path to SCOOP events as part of the popular PokerStars Power Path promotion.
When all things were said and done, more than $74k in SCOOP tickets was given away, allowing thousands of players to participate in their favorite tournaments without paying the full price.
As PokerStars continues to grow in North American markets, the chances to qualify for major events like these are becoming ever more ample, along with various promotions that award plenty of seats for flagship tournament series.
Hundreds of Trophies Given Away
Playing in this year’s North American SCOOP gave players a chance to fight for millions in prize money, but also bragging rights and valuable physical trophies, which will be delivered to all the tournament champions in the weeks to come.
Over in Michigan and New Jersey, two players under screennames “ChipNCheese” and “slingshotbob” took down multiple events and will be receiving three deliveries from PokerStars each after a super-successful series.
The same feat was repeated by “MrShikaDance711” who won three events, two of them coming in back-to-back days, with “Unflappable5” also winning events in back-to-back days at PokerStars PA.
Another PA players under the screenname “Vaysmoney” also took down three titles, with most other champions having to content with “just” one trophy from this particular tournament festival.
More to Come from PokerStars in North America
Over the last few years, PokerStars has been on a serious expansion across North America, combining its NJ and MI player pools, as we await PA to join the same compact and other states to legalize online poker, which could give PokerStars a chance to expand into new markets as well (#GrowPAPoker!).
This year’s North American SCOOP shattered guaranteed prize pools across the board, demonstrating the massive interest of American players in online poker, and giving us some insight into the future of the game in this part of the world.
Stay tuned for more information on upcoming PokerStars tournament festivals in North American markets, or join PokerStars US or PokerStars ON today to get your online poker career off the ground.
