Last week, students attending the University of Nevada Las Vegas were given a special treat when famed poker and blackjack expert Andy Bloch stopped by the campus for a lecture on the life of a professional gambler and card counter.

Bloch, who first gained notoriety as a member of the infamous MIT Blackjack Team, relived some of his stories during his card-counting days during the 1980’s, 1990’s, and into the 21st century. Currently an on-staff poker pro for FullTiltPoker.com, Andy also delved into the realism of card counting as portrayed in such movies as the recent hit “21”, starring Kevin Spacy.

Bloch also discussed trade secrets of the MIT card-counting team, such as common hand-signals the group would use to communicate with each other without alerting the casino security staff, and even broke down the intricacies of how much to tip a dealer so that you could give off the illusion that you were merely random tourist, not a professional gambler.

Certain scenes from “21” were then showed to the audience, which Bloch would dissect and critique based on realism on what parts were true to his real life experiences, and which were movie drama that were added in for extra effect.

Afterwards, Bloch moved on to discussions of his career as a professional poker player and gave insights into his self-admitted analytical style of play.

For more info on Andy Bloch you can visit his blog over at FullTiltPoker.com