Waitress Nicki dreams of becoming the first woman to win the World Series of Poker.  Her sister Ashley, a single parent, dreams of creating a secure future for her son.  When Nicki’s bar is put up for sale, she hatches a plan to buy it for her sister and make both their dreams come true.

SYNOPSIS:

Synopsis:

We meet Nicki as she’s teaching a poker class at a casino before a tournament. She’s in her early thirties, attractive, and snarky. She doesn’t take any crap for anyone and is unapologetically single and sexually active. At the tournament, she’s beaten by a young, smug guy. As she’s cashing out, she meets a handsome player whom she invites back to her hotel room. Their sexual encounter goes wrong as he turns out to be a jerk and disrespectful of her sexual needs and boundaries. She kicks him out leaving her alone and frustrated.

Back at home her sister Ashley, a mid-twenties single mom, reminds her of their financial troubles. Ashley is the opposite of her sister, straight-laced, serious, but very vulnerable. She informs Nicki that she has a job offer to work as a bookkeeper in the North Dakota oil fields which will provide her and her son some stability. Nicki isn’t happy and tries but fails to convince her to stay in Minnesota.

Later they meet at the bar where Nicki works. We meet BC, an over-worked, exhausted delivery driver who is Nicki’s “friend with benefits” with whom Nicki has avoided commitment. Mike the bar owner, tells them that he’s retiring and selling the bar. Ashely gets Mike to agree to sell the bar to them, but they will need the down payment in a couple of weeks or he’s selling to a corporation who will remodel the bar removing the poker nights. Nicki gets the idea to teach Ashley poker and together enter a tournament to earn the money.

Nicki and Ashley travel to Iowa for a tournament. At first, they are winning, but In the end, they lose all their money and have to start over from square one.

Frustrated with their situation, Ashley gets into a huge fight with Nicki and packs up and leaves with her son for North Dakota. Nicki gets the idea to con her poker player friends into staking her, overselling the shares, and throwing the tournament to collect enough money to buy the bar and not have to pay back anyone.

Nicki arrives at the World Series of Poker Main Event and enters the tournament. Nicki’s plan goes awry when she is unable to deliberately lose and ends up advancing; putting her above the amount she needed to stop at to succeed in her scheme of duping her backers.

All of her poker friends and BC show up at the tournament. Ashley confronts Nicki about the plan. Nicki confesses and reveals she’s in trouble as now they will have to pay everyone off. BC is through with Nicki’s games and breaks up with her, leaving her devastated.

Ashley brokers an agreement. The guys will get all the winnings, but if Nicki makes final table, they will split the winnings with her which will be enough to buy the bar. Nicki agrees but is still reeling from her breakup. During the tournament, she looks up to see BC hasn’t left and is cheering her on from the stands. This motivates Nicki to push for the win. There are a couple of close calls but she finally beats the last player, the young, smug guy from the first scene to get to the final table.

Nicki and BC are engaged. Meanwhile, Ashley is overseeing improvements to her new bar

POKER QUEENS