World Championship Online Poker Site Sends 7 to WSOP

Poker Stars Players at the WSOP

PokerStars.com, the world's largest poker tournament destination, announced today that 7 of its online qualifiers for the World Series of Poker (WSOP) are still vying for the $5 million top prize, gold bracelet and the title of "World Champion of Poker."

PokerStars qualified 316 players for the $10,000 buy-in event at the WSOP through online 'satellite tournaments.' These tournaments allow a player to risk a small amount of money for a chance to win a seat in a larger tournament like the $10,000 buy-in event at the WSOP. Two of the remaining PokerStars players won their entries in $33 tournaments on the poker site. The 2004 World Series of Poker began on Saturday with 2,576 players and was narrowed to 32 by the end of the day on Wednesday. The total prize pool for the event is over $24 million with $5 million going to first place. Thursday will take the field from 32 to 9 (the final table) and Friday a new champion will emerge after accumulating all of the nearly $26 million tournament chips.

PokerStars Poker Room Manager, Lee Jones, is understandably proud of the tournament success of PokerStars' players. "Our players continue to prove that online poker can not be ignored. PokerStars was the launching point for Chris Moneymaker, the 2003 WSOP Champion, and now we have multiple players with a real chance to fill that role again in 2004." Dan Goldman, VP of Marketing for PokerStars, is crossing his fingers. "We're still the only online poker site to have produced a World Champion of Poker and if one of our remaining 7 players comes through on Friday, we can lay claim to that title for at least one more year."

PokerStars, a member of the World Poker Tour, has earned a reputation as a leader in online poker by balancing its online poker offerings with land-based tie-ins like seats in the World Series of Poker and the World Poker Tour Championship. In July, PokerStars will host the largest online poker tournament in the world - the World Championship of Online Poker. The tournament will guarantee $4 million in payouts and is expected to draw over 20,000 players into its twelve events.