I had heard that the River Cree Casino in Edmonton was supposed to be fantastic, so Aaron and I stopped by as we arrived in Edmonton on Friday for the Superbowl get-together. The poker room seemed reasonable, perhaps a bit smaller than some Alberta casinos but it looked like they had tables outside the actual room to expand if necessary.
Surprisingly, there were no limit games at all running yet at 7 pm on a Friday, but there were about 5 full $1-2 NLHE games rolling. Walking by the main game, one dude had what looked like a sickly $1500-2000 in front of him. The max buy-in is a staggering $500, but I only bought in for $300 and sat down at the end table. The first hand I played I flopped the nut flush in a raised pot. I checked, the raiser bet $80 all-in, a donkey who acts before me called, I raised another $100, donk called and bullet check-called the rest of his stack of $120 on a blank turn with bottom two pair. This $750 pot sustained me for the rest of the night as I didn’t get much.
I heard one of my neighbors whisper that one of the two girls who was railbirding this game (rooting for one of the fish) was none other than Jerome Iginla’s sister Theresa, but I didn’t hear that clearly and couldn’t be sure. After a quick google search a few minutes ago, I can confirm it from the photo. Kind of interesting.
Anyways my NLHE cash game experience is very limited and I basically just use common poker sense and my NL tournament knowledge, but this game is so action packed in Alberta right now that I’m seriously considering giving it some solid study.
