Stefan Maloney Defeats Leo Zhang in Epic Heads Up

March 3, 2026

Level:	28 (50000/100000/100000 PLO)
Entries:	1/75
Prizes:	$21,825
Local Time:	4:30 AM

While things seemed to go pretty quickly early on in this game, my prediction of a long day ultimately came true. Mostly, however, that was down to a fairly insane heads-up battle between Stefan Maloney and Leo Zhang that went on for nearly 90 minutes.

They played four levels in the head-to-head, but it wasn’t because no one was putting chips in. Zhang was on the ropes no less than 5 times during the HU battle, only to somehow find a way to get there. In one case, he was dominated with queen-three into queen-ten, but found two pair with his three to survive.

The three was particulary nice to Zhang tonight. In another hand, he again found two pair to survive in a PLO round, hitting a nine-three. Maloney had a hard time believing it was actually happening, but Zhang seemingly couldn’t die.

By the time they hit Level 28, the average stack was less than 10 big blinds going into a PLO round. Maloney pretty much had the lead all the way through, but just couldn’t drive the final nail.

Zhang was very short again, and it all went in on the flop after Maloney potted and Zhang called. Zhang was very live drawing to diamonds, while Mak\loney was on top pair with backdoor clubs. Miraculously, the queen held to finally end the night.

You might think from the spirited battle that all the money was in play. Nothing could be further from the truth. Instead, the pair battled for 90 minutes over $200 and the trophy. When all was said and done, Maloney pocketed $6,420 to Zhang’s $6,220, but I think Maloney was most happy about being able to take a trophy home for his daughter.

Worth noting that Maloney is a bit of a wizard in this format. With this game, three of his four career wins are in this format, and he also has 7 more final table appearances in the two-card/four-card mix