Circuit crusher Matt Higgins adds million-dollar bracelet to nine rings

Posted on: June 29, 2026 23:21 PDT

He’s one of the most decorated players on the WSOP Circuit with nine rings, a pair of Main Event titles, a Mini Main Event title, a Monster Stack title, and almost $1M on that tour alone.

Now Matt Higgins has another $1M in one fell swoop after taking down the World Series of Poker $1,000 Mystery Millions event and a gold bracelet to go with those nine rings.

Higgins bested no less than 22,811 entries, the largest-ever $1K tournament in WSOP history, and the fourth-largest of all time to claim the $1M first prize.

Key elements of a million-dollar photo: two flying aces and a rubber duckie perched atop 910M chips.

In a heads-up battle between the American Southeast and Eastern Europe, Georgia native Higgins defeated Polish superstar Dominik Panka heads-up to complete a comeback he could feel coming as early as last night. An ambassador for ‘Bet on Yourself’ clothing, Higgins embodied the moniker more so than ever to win this one.

“What’s really crazy is I knew yesterday. I came back from dinner, and I had 9.1M (chips), and I just started winning, like every hand. Winning all my flips, which is pretty surprising.”

That 9.1M became over 910M less than 24 hours later as he was declared the champion.

Matthew Higgins was mobbed as soon as the final card fell.

Higgins was mobbed by friends as soon as the final card fell.

There was a sense of relief along with the joy of his win, as Higgins admitted that the win came at a great time, saying that he’d been on the wrong side of variance for the last several months.

“The bracelet’s great, but a million dollars? I’ve been downswinging really hard. A $300K downswing since I won the Choctaw Main Event last November, so, man, it's a great feeling.”

For the family

A great feeling also was that of the support from a boisterous rail of friends and supporters, who piled onto the WSOP mothership stage to celebrate with Higgins after the final card fell.

Besides thanking those folks in person, the champion made sure to say that this win was, as always, for his kids and fiancée.

The wide angle lens was needed to get everyone into Higgins' winners photo.

For a player with more than $3.3 million in Hendon Mob earnings, and playing so much as to have as significant a downswing as he mentioned, the words ‘life-changing’ might not come to the forefront after a million-dollar win, but Higgins says that may indeed be the case.

“I’m not going to be playing as much. Obviously, I always play the Cherokee stop because it’s 2 1/2 hours from my house. All the family’s there; everybody that I care about is there to play. They’re probably not going to see me much other than Cherokee. This gives me some room to figure some things out other than poker.”

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Great runs for Smith and Baker

While he may not have won the tournament, Brian Smith had to be thrilled to continue his incredible spin-up all the way to a fifth-place finish for $290K to go with the $100K bounty that he pulled Sunday for charity. Smith had been on a stack of just eight big blinds when an incredible runout saved his tournament and began his ascent to Monday’s final table finish.

Brian Smith added another $290K to his Mystery Millions earnings.

Meanwhile, David ‘ODB’ Baker’s quest for a fifth WSOP bracelet fell disappointingly short in seventh place after entering the day second in chips. Baker could take solace in the fact that it was not only his best run of the summer for $176,000, but it also propelled him into a share of the lead in 25K Fantasy.

And really, isn’t that almost as important as a bracelet in the summer?

$1,000 Mystery Millions final table results: