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July 13  |  3 a.m. ET

Is this the year a woman finally wins the main event? At about this time in last year's tournament there were two women remaining, with Maria Ho advancing the furthest with a 38th-place finish.

This year, there are once again two women remaining, but the difference is that this time, one of them is among the chip leaders.

Tiffany Michelle, who is a familiar face in poker circles as the hostess for Pokernews.com, stood in third place with an estimated 3.8 million in chips as of 11:30 p.m. Las Vegas time tonight. Only 82 of the original 6,844 players remained as of this writing. (Lisa Parsons was the other woman still alive, although hanging on with a short stack.)

Apparently, all those hours interviewing poker players is paying off. Perhaps she got some tips from Ho, who is a friend of hers.

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In addition to being a poker player, actress and online hostess, Michelle is a licensed massage therapist.

If Michelle makes the final table, she will be only the second woman accomplish the feat (Barbara Enright, 5th in 1995), and the first since the so-called poker boom led to such huge fields in the main event.

Some good clicks ...

July 13  |  2:30 a.m. ET

The day's roundup (from The Associated Press)

DAY: 9 (Officially known as Day 5).

BIG NEWS: Play slowed considerably at the World Series of Poker on Saturday, as the top tier of the field held powerful chip stacks and enough rounders had been eliminated to let players be more picky about their hands.

Some players used the breathing room to tighten their play and only play pots with good starting hands. Others used the extra chips to play more hands, driving up action and leading to big pots for players holding less-than-stellar hands.

After more than four and a half hours of play Saturday, 70 players had been eliminated, leaving 119 players competing and allowing the average stack to creep over 1 million chips.

STUD OF THE DAY: Barry Leventhal, 44, of New York, who got 11-time bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth to fold an open-ended straight and flush draw on the flop by moving all-in for 399,000 chips. Hellmuth took several minutes to make his decision, because with both draws, there was a good chance he would have at least made the straight. Hellmuth folded his hand face-up, drawing groans and second guesses from other players at the table and nearby spectators. Leventhal was later eliminated.

BUSTED OUT: Tournament professional Gus Hansen, two-time gold bracelet winner Hoyt Corkins

UP NEXT: On Sunday, about 80 to 100 players will play down to 27 players, the final three tables, in preparation for the last day of play Monday before the final table in November.

POKER TALK: Stealing blinds: Raising a pot in hopes that all opponents will fold, giving the raiser a small pot consisting of the blinds and antes.

As play started Saturday, Cristian Dragomir of Bucharest, Romania, was in third place and raised a pot from the dealer spot to 50,000 chips. At that point, each player had a required ante of 1,000 chips, the small blind was 5,000 and the big blind was 10,000 chips. This meant there was already 24,000 in the pot, which Dragomir stole by raising and forcing everyone else to fold.

HE SAID WHAT?: “In life, cards have brains. I didn’t know this until about four months ago. ... If you’ve got the positive energy, it may take a little while, but the cards will come.” — Mike “The Mouth” Matusow, after doubling his chip stack to about 740,000 chips on a pair of queens.

July 11  |  10 p.m. ET

The day's roundup (from The Associated Press)

DAY: 8 (Officially known as Day 4).

BIG NEWS: Card by card, pot by pot, the World Series of Poker pressed on Friday, with prize money already a certainty for the players who remained, but the effects of a grueling play schedule creeping in.

Players were given an extra hour off before resuming play after a long session in which they burst through the money bubble. Survivors established themselves in the top 9.7 percent of the field — winners of some piece of a $64.3 million pie in the no-limit Hold ’em tournament that attracted 6,844 entrants.

Play started Friday with 464 players, and two hours later, 114 had been eliminated. Tournament officials expected play to slow as more people are eliminated and the average number of chips each player holds increased.

STUD OF THE DAY: Jenna Phillips was assured a spot at the tournament’s final table Friday when she won the series’ dealer of the year award. Phillips won the award over hundreds of others who tournament officials say are carefully vetted each year to deal cards at the event. Phillips began the day with the traditional “Shuffle up and deal” announcement, and was told that she had been hired to deal cards at the final table in November.

BUSTED OUT: “Survivor: China” contestant and nightclub owner Jean-Robert Bellande, 2007 pot-limit Omaha champion Robert Mizrachi, special education teacher Brian Schaedlich, who lost more than 800,000 in chips in less than 11 hours of play Thursday and Friday.

UP NEXT: Remaining players will resume Saturday until 50 to 100 players are left.

POKER TALK: Go into the tank: When a player pauses to think about what to do next during a big situation, reviewing the hand and deciding whether to call, fold or raise. With a board showing a queen, eight and three, all diamonds, Jason Su, a poker player from Houston, went into the tank after betting 60,000 and being raised 219,000 by Alberto Font, once the tournament’s chip leader. After a few minutes, Su re-raised all-in and Font called. Su made three eights to beat Font’s three threes, and Font was eliminated.

HE SAID WHAT?: “Phil (Hellmuth), please don’t send me home with a 10-9. Dealer, please don’t send me home with a 10-9. Don’t do it to me.” — Jean-Robert Bellande, a 37-year-old former “Survivor: China” contestant from Las Vegas who was all-in with an ace and a queen against the 10-9 of Sarkis Akopyan of Moscow. Bellande erupted with excitement when an ace hit on the flop to pair his cards, but his face blanched two cards later when Akopyan hit a six and a seven to make a straight.

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