Shane Patreau loses million-dollar poker game

Awwwwwww!

Shane Patreau, a former Saultite now on parental leave from Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corp.'s Thousand Islands Charity Casino in Gananoque, lost his chance to win a million U.S. dollars today playing poker.

Shane won an all-expenses-paid trip to Nassau, Bahamas after placing third out of 4,781 players in a online tournament at ParadisePoker.com.

The final table was played today at the Crystal Palace Casino at Wyndham Nassau Resort.

Shane (shown) playing today in Nassau, finished fourth and took home $10,000.

His brother Matt Patreau, ace sales manager at Superior 7 Advertising Ltd., went down to Nassau as part of Shane's crack cheerleading squad.

The US$1 million first prize went to Santino Sgambelluri, a naval officer stationed in Hawaii.

Santino is originally from Guam.

He was ranked number one going into today's contest. Santino is a husband and father of two. Prior to today's game, he said: "if I won a million dollars I would invest it wisely."

Placing second today was Ryan Boyes from Atlanta, Georgia, who was also ranked second going into the contest.

Here's how Patreau's play was described in the ongoing tournament blog:

"[Patreau] had a great run today. The player with the travelling fan club from Canada unfortunately couldn't win the last hand. He reraised [Sgambelluri] all in pre-flop. [Sgambelluri] called and turned over JJ. [Patreau] showed AKs.

The flop came 910J giving [Sgambelluri] a set, while giving [Patreau] a gutshot straight. The 10 on the turn sealed [Patreau]'s fate."