Brandon Cantu Leads Day 1A of WPT Bay 101 Shooting Stars, Wins $10k

JC Tran, pictured here with WPT hostess Layla Kayleigh, is one of the Shooting Stars left in the field after Day 1A of the WPT Bay 101 Shooting Stars event. (Bodog Beat Image)

"Waiting For a Star to Fall" is an extremely underrated 80's song by Boy Meets Girl, but it is also what the crowds at the Bay 101 Casino in San Jose were doing on the rail of the WPT Bay 101 Shooting Stars event.

Those crowds were not disappointed as there were 24 "Shooting Stars," otherwise known as name pros who had a $5,000 bounty on their heads, in the field for Day 1A and all but five of them fell, including Gus Hansen, Team Bodog poker pro David Williams, Hoyt Corkins, David "The Dragon" Pham, and Joe Sebok. The five remaining Stars were JC Tran, Miami John Cernuto, Kathy Liebert, Layne Flack and Men "The Master" Nguyen.

Leading the pack after Day 1A is Brandon Cantu, who himself is responsible for pointing Bill Edler and John Juanda to the exit, collecting the $5,000 bounty for each of them plus a personalized t-shirt with the face of the Star eliminated. Cantu also received a $10,000 bonus for ending the day with the chip lead. Only one day into the event and he's already made $20,000. Not too shabby, got his buy-in back plus an extra $10k, we'd settle for that after a day's work.

Here are the top ten chip counts after Day 1A:

1. Brandon Cantu - 242,300
2. Thanh Che - 215,700
3. Paul Britto - 188,500
4. Chanh Pham - 159,900
5. Zack Felder - 150,500
6. Joe Graziano - 143,600
7. Ed Fernandez - 131,200
8. J.C. Tran - 115,600
9. Mel Nicholson - 88,500
10. Serena Liu - 88,100

Day 1B gets underway in about an hour local time and the other 26 "Shooting Stars" will be in the field. We'll keep you posted on the action here at the Beat.

If you want a chance to play in a World Poker Tour event and go up against the best the poker world has to offer, then head over to Bodog and qualify online for the WPT and win a $12,000 "Player's Choice" package.

Here is the video for "Waiting For a Star to Fall" by Boy Meets Girl: