WORLD SERIES OF POKER: Cada, Moon face off for top prize

Joseph Cada and Darvin Moon will play for the championship of the World Series of Poker’s Main Event on Monday night after Antoine Saout was eliminated from play in third place at 5:51 a.m. Sunday. Saout takes home $3.48 million.

Cada, 21, from Shelby Township, Mich., is the chip leader with 135.95 million going into Monday’s head-up final at the Rio, starting at 10 p.m. Moon, 46, from Oakland, Md. has 58.85 million in chips.

The winner takes home $8.5 million while runnerup collects $5.18 million. The pair outlasted a field of nine over more than 14 hours of poker action Saturday and Sunday inside the Rio’s Penn & Teller Theater, the longest final table for a Main Event.

In July, 6,494 players began play in the $10,000 buy-in no-limit hold’em world championship event.

Cada, who began the day in fifth place, is seeking to become the youngest winner of the World Series of Poker’s Main Event. Cada took over as the chip leader at 5:30 a.m. Sunday, on the first hand after the field was cut to three.

On the 276th hand, he pulled a king on the river card to beat Saout’s pair of eights. It wasn’t the first time Cada came up lucky.

Several times over the two days, Cada was close to elimination. On the 123rd hand, he pulled a pair on the river to double up Phil Ivey when he was down to his last 2.25 million in chips.

“I got lucky, but I just played the cards I had when I had them,” Cada said.

He became the fifth different player to hold the chip lead Saturday and Sunday, along with Saout, Moon, Eric Buchman and Steven Begleiter.

Saout, 25, was trying to become the first citizen of France to win the Main Event.

He began the day in seventh place with 9.5 million in chips, but he quickly moved up the leader board.

Moon began the day in first place with 58.93 million in chips, almost the same amount he ended with, meaning Cada picked up all remaining chips on the board.