Poker at Penn State just got bigger.

Last week, Penn State hosted the kickoff ceremony for the third annual College Poker Championship, and in a separate event, a few lucky students were taken out to dinner by representatives from RoyalVegasPoker.com.

"Penn State is no longer just a linebacker university -- it's a poker university," Lou Krieger, College Poker Championship host, said as he presented a trophy to the Penn State Gaming Association in the HUB-Robeson Center on Friday.

Penn State was the first-place winner of last year's online poker tournament. The university outplayed 2,400 other schools across 55 countries for the championship title, having the largest number of successful players.

University of Florida came in second place but was not a close second, Krieger said.

"You deserve it," Krieger said as he handed over the trophy. "You won, worldwide."

College Poker Championship III is a no limit, Texas Hold'em competition in which students compete to win $135,000 in scholarships, $10,000 in charitable donations, which are given to an organization of the winner's choice, and a chance to win one of four new giveaway cars.

"Poker is a game of incomplete information, and that really models life," Krieger said. "There's some luck involved, but playing poker helps you to ... make decisions based on what you have in front of you. Many of life's lessons can be learned at the poker table, and I think that to at least some degree, universities acknowledge that."

The competition, which is played online at CollegePoker.com, has weekly qualifier games every Sunday afternoon starting at 4 p.m. The top 5 percent of players from each week will qualify to compete in the next round.

The College Poker Championship wasn't the only thing poker to hit the State College scene last week. On Tuesday, two representatives from RoyalVegasPoker.com, which sponsors the College Poker Championship, came to town to treat some of their best Penn State poker players to dinner at Zola New World Bistro, 324 W. College Ave.

Andrew Michaels and Julia Van-Niekerk, plan managers for Royal Vegas Poker, came to Penn State all the way from Johannesburg, South Africa, as part of a two-week promotional tour of the States.

Michaels and Van-Niekerk said they invited 10 college poker players to dinner so that they could meet their college customers and "find out what players want."

Michaels said the selection process for the invite list was simple.

"We chose some high rollers and a few middle-range players so that we had diversity," Michaels said. "We have a large number of poker players from State College."

Van-Niekerk said Penn State is the only college they will be visiting on the tour.

The players at Zola's were mostly Penn State students, however, some other students traveled to State College for the event.

Brian Tessmer, a 21-year-old junior at the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown, came to State College last Tuesday night to dine with fellow poker players.

Tessmer said he spent an average of eight hours a day on RoyalVegasPoker.com this past summer.

"I made a two-week paycheck in one night, so I quit working at my job at the factory," he said. "At first, my dad wasn't happy, but then he saw all of the money I was making and that I wasn't making it up. He had to be OK with it -- as long as I wasn't losing my tuition or anything."

Justin Pontosky (junior-economics) said he started playing poker for money in middle school.

"It's a pretty good investment if it's something you're good at," Pontosky said.

Pontosky said that if he had enough capital, he would quit working as a waiter and keep poker as his only source of income.

"I've always wanted to be an entrepreneur, but this just seems like an easy way out," he said.