Our company had another lunchtime Texas Hold'Em tournament today.

There were 3 tables with 8 players each. The person with the most chips at each table, along with the person with the next highest chip count, would advance to the final table next month.

The tournament was limited to 1 hour, so the action moved pretty quickly.

Hand of the day:
3 people left at my table.
5 minutes left in the hour.
I have about 1500 chips.
Player A has about 5300 chips.
Player B has about 1200 chips.

Player B goes all in and player A folds. I'm holding 9-8 suited, which is usually an easy fold when someone else goes all-in.

But:
1) I'm running out of time. Considering our blind structure, player A is a lock to finish with the most chips at our table. If I'm gonna end up as the non-winner with the most chips, I figured I needed to end up with at least 3200 chips.

2) Since I have 9 high, I know I'm going to be behind in the hand if I call. But I have a suited connector, and the only way I'd be in real trouble is if the other person has a high pocket pair or has an 8 or 9 with a better kicker.

So I call, and I'm happy to see that player B has Ace-4 suited. I get lucky and get my 9 on the flop, and I knock out player B.

In the end, I ended up with 3600 chips.

A non-winner at another table ended up with 3550 chips, so I made it to the final table by 50 chips!