Wed, 02/09/2011 – 03:33 – PokerPages Staff

The new season of ’High Stakes Poker’ cash game show will air later this month with a new host.

Former ‘Saturday Night Live’ star and comedian Norm MacDonald takes the reigns from Gabe Kaplan. MacDonald will feature alongside decorated poker pro Kara Scott.

The 47 year-old is a regular at the World Series of Poker and has ridden the money bubble to cash on two occasions.

Team PokerStars sponsored pros Daniel Negreanu and Barry Greenstein are among the players who will compete during Season 7 of the popular series.

There will be a $200,000 minimum buy in this time around. Blinds will be $400/$800 with a $100 ante.

Team Full Tilt Poker pros will not feature due to PokerStars’ association with the show meaning Phil Ivey, Tom Dwan and Gus Hansen are absent from the proceedings.

Team PokerStars Pro Vanessa Selbst will make her debut, becoming the third female to join the male dominated set at the Bellagio.

2010 World Series of Poker Main Event winner Jonathan Duhamel, Poker Hall of Famer Doyle Brunson, Jason Mercier, Antonio Esfandiari and Phil Laak are also named among the official cast list.

Season 7 will get underway on Saturday, February 26 at 8pm (ET) on the Game Show Network. A repeat will air the following Sunday at 11pm (ET).

Sat, 01/29/2011 – 00:02 – PokerPages Staff

Online poker player ‘Ilvdnfl’ was the big winner on PokerStars in mid week after taking down $173,000 in various high stakes cash games.

‘Ilvdnfl’, who is rumored to nosebleed regular Di Dang, benefitted from several lucrative $100/$200 Pot Limit Omaha sessions against ‘MauriceSch’ and ‘Also11′ on the world’s biggest online poker site on Wednesday.

Those figures pushed his profits for the week past the $350,000 mark. The PLO specialist is now on an upswing of $741,000 for the calendar year.

Cash games on rival sites have been quiet this week as the likes of Phil Ivey, Tom Dwan and Patrik Antonius are competing in the Aussie Millions in Melbourne.

David Benefield posted the best figures on Full Tilt Poker. Benefield won $91,000 in lengthy PLO exchanges. Van Marcus (+$45,000) also prospered.

Dang, who plays under the ‘Urindanger’ alias on Full Tilt, failed to generate any heat despite his alleged successes at PokerStars. He ended the evening with losses of $106,000.

However, Dang has been one of the front runners during the early stages of 2011 and if the rumors are to be believed, is now on an upswing of around $1.5 million for both of his online accounts.

There were several big losers on PokerStars as ‘MauriceSch’ (-$104,000) and ‘Sauce123′ (-$104,000) dropped six figure sums. ‘Also11′ (-$77,000) and ‘Looney Gerbil’ (-$73,000) rounded out the top four.