Help a tournament newbie out...

[sapsuckah]

Haven't read other replies yet, so forgive me if I'm repeating stuff.

1. 99 UTG can be a raise or a limp depending on table conditions and your stack. With your stack (26 BBs) I could honestly go either way but I'm leaning slightly toward limping.

3. I would think that I had the best hand here also. But I really don't want to see another card and have and A or K hit the turn. The pot is pretty close to the size of your remaining stack, so pushing here is completely reasonable.

As for your comment on betting with the best hand, much more often than not you'll find that same reasoning applies to NLHE as well.