DON McDERMOTT / PVT Five present and former Pahrump residents had their problems in the World Series of Poker, which got under way last weekend in the Rio All-Suites Hotel and Casino. Going without cashing were Don Barton ... Butch Dole ... Ryan Nielsen ... Javaid Daniel ... and Chuck Staubs. Staubs now resides in Atlantic City, where he is a dealer at the Borgata. Advertisement

LAS VEGAS -- Lady Luck and her friend Mr. Skill ruled the cards Friday and Saturday, for four Pahrump Valley players in the World Series of Poker.

In the $5,000 buy-in mixed hold'em tournament which attracted 451 players, Don Barton, a Pahrump realtor and long-time poker professional, did not cash. With $536,287 out of a $2,119,700 prize pool going to 21-year-old Chicagoan Steve Ballirikis, Barton was shut out.

Three valley players -- 21-year-old Ryan Nielsen, Javaid Daniel and Butch Dole -- and former resident Chuck Staubs, now of Atlantic City, N.J., didn't get any cash out of the $500 Casino Employees no-limit hold'em prize pool of $467,700.

That tournament was won by 24-year-old Orleans Casino dealer Eric Narciso, who got a payoff of $104,701. Narciso was 27th in the 2006 employees' tournament.

Several more Pahrump players are scheduled to compete in the WSOP before the $10,000 buy-in championship tournament begins July 6. That list includes Rollie Batayola, Skip Woodland, Jim Robertson, Blake Lozo, Buzz Busbee and Dole, along with Hoppy and Carolyn Hopkins, Doug Gregory and Dave Vee.

Their goal: make enough money to pay the $10,000 and go after the winner's share in the finals. The prize pool for the big one will range between $65 million and $75 million if the early estimates that between 6,500 and 7,500 will enter.

Tournament officials at the Rio All-Suites Hotel and Casino have established a schedule to allow for 3,000 players to compete on one of three days set aside for Day One action. If 9,000 to enter, the prize pool would be $90 million (minus entry fees and house share), with $15 million going to the winner.

In 2006, 8,773 entered, with Jamie Gold earning $12 million out of a prize pool of more than $82 million.

Still going on Monday was the $1,500 no-limit tournament which attracted an event record 2,998 players, who generated a prize pool totaling $4,497,000. Most of those players stood in line for up to five hours to register for that tournament.

Daniel and Dole were in line to pay their $500 entry fee when the employees' tournament started; they missed more than an hour of action before they finally got seated in the main room. Players were actually in two sections of the Amazon Room, and filled 60 tables in an air-conditioned tent at the rear of the hotel.

Staubs, a poker dealer at the Borgata Casino on the Boardwalk and a former Pahrump resident, was ranked 45th in chips with $18,000 at the end of the first day. But he was eliminated before the top 100 -- who would get some cash back -- was determined.

NOTES -- The World Series of Poker management announced that poker fans will be able to watch tape-delayed hole-card coverage of final-table play at more than a dozen bracelet events and get real-time chip counts and results for all events on www.worldseriesofpoker.com, thanks to a new digital publishing alliance with Bluff Media, which will also provide radio coverage of WSOP events every day on Sirius Satellite Radio, as well as other radio outlets.

ESPN coverage of the 2007 tournament will begin July 10 and continue for two hours each Tuesday night through Oct. 30, except for July 24 ... The tournament runs through July 17.