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Charles Reinke Snags First Place Despite Not Playing Twelve Bingos in Three Games

1st Charles Reinke finished 4-1 with a sizable spread of +524. One look at his opponent's average score of 323 makes it clear how he was able to rack up so much spread. Charles cleverly tanked his first game against Peter Schmiedicke, losing 368-394, in order to play easier competition in the rest of his games. He even went so far as to allow Peter's phony DRYINGS to stay on the board so as to supplement his losing chances. Of course, in the real world, Charles has perfect knowledge of which -ING words take an S. Simultaneous to that game, Charles defeated Betty Hasselkus 490-285, playing the high-probability EULOGIST and ATONIES against Betty's DEITIES. Another 200-point margin was attained against Gail Salm, who fell 307-517. Gail managed to play INCITERS, but Charles ran away with it, playing PLIMSOLE, AREOLES, and the word of the week, OXTONGUE (n. a European herb).

2nd Aaron Bader played just three games, but thoroughly dominated in all of them, playing four bingos and scoring over 500 in each one. Thus, his record of 3-0 +619 might be the best three-game performance in club history. The massacre commenced when Aaron matched up against Barb Besadny and won easily, 531-234, playing GREEDIER (appropriate), EASIEST (also appropriate), GASEITY, and UNPAIRED. His second game, he was matched against an opponent who was also coming off a 200-point win, Gail Salm, but this fact did not cause his resolve to falter, and he cleaned up with a 512-349 victory. His four bingos in that one were GAOLERS, FLEETING, EREMITES, and TRENDERS, the last of which is not good in any human dictionary. Aaron ended his night prematurely with a 527-368 drubbing of top expert Thomas Reinke. The bearded twin got EGESTION and PUNISHES, but lost momentum with a phony BESEIGER (although he will be quick to point out that the correct spelling didn't fit). Meanwhile, Aaron's inability to draw bad tiles continued unchecked, as he played CANDELA, DROOPIER, BRUITERS, and TANTIVY.

3rd Dennis Lloyd went 3-1 +120 and improved his yearly record to an even 6-6. He got off to a good start by defeating Helen Flores on her home turf, 408-348. PRETEND and MILIEUS (MILIEUX also being acceptable) were his bingos; Helen played ROMANCE and lamented at the fact that it never got extended to the new word, BROMANCE. Against Richard Lauder, Dennis won cleanly, 403-309. Richard had an early two-blank CARRIES, but Dennis pulled ahead for good with his play of ROUSING. Richard was also punished for playing DOLMA thinking that it didn't take an S, as he only knew the "real" plural of the word, which is DOLMADES. Peter Schmiedicke was the only one to hand Dennis a loss, and he did it in convincing fashion, winning 489-356. Despite the gulf between their scores, the two players matched each other bingo-for-bingo: Peter had DRONGOS and TOWERED to Dennis' AILERON and DEVIATE.

Two new bingos were played this week, both by Charles: IONISER and BLEAREST. The club also reached a milestone, having played its 10,000th unique bingo. However, there are still some 46,000 left to be played, and most of the low-hanging fruit (in the form of high-probability words) has been plucked off the tree and consumed, so even 20,000 is probably a decade off.

After a period of inactivity, the club's Facebook page is being resurrected: https://www.facebook.com/Madison-Scrabble-Club-388301582736 . We will try to feature photos of cool plays or other notable things, so if a cool or notable thing happens in your game, snap a picture of it or get one of the twins to do it.

Peter Schmiedicke Should Start Charging for the Scrabble Lessons He Gives to People

1st Peter Schmiedicke snagged the first place spot despite a blemished 3-1 +414 record, beating out four other players who had the same win-loss record. To do this, he had to rally out of a 90-point hole dug for him by Lynda Finn, who beat him in the first game 463-370. Lynda won the ever-important bingo battle, playing RAMBLED, PTERINS, and RETINOLS, while Peter got WINTERS and COOTIES. Peter followed up that disappointing loss with a pair of 200-point victories, 471-257 against Helen Flores and 531-278 against a certain Dave Gilligan who had just set a new high-water mark for himself with a 544 game. Against Helen, Peter had INSTARS and AILERON, while Dave was forced to spectate as Peter laid down ODORANT, LIPREAD, and MAUNDERS against him. As the 2-1 player with the highest point spread, Peter was matched against the undefeated Thomas Reinke in the last round, and he rose to the challenge, winning a close one, 444-424. Thomas played SPRITZED for 110, but Peter was able to bingo consistently throughout the game, getting down GRODIEST, DREARIES, and COMBINES.

2nd Charles Reinke went 3-1 +397, but, in averaging just 445 points per game, he allowed his yearly game average to fall below 500, perhaps never to return. He took down the always-tough Bryan Benwitz with relative ease, winning 469-345. Bryan found the odd-looking KEENERS, but Charles outdid that with POINTED, FIREHOSE, and the Word of the Week, SCABLAND. Lynda Finn, fresh from kicking butts in Portland, had similar luck or worse against Charles, losing 269-523. While she was forced to stare at unworkable letters the whole game, Charles got down ANNULET and MEDDLES. Not in every game could the tiles be so favorable for Charles; a matchup against archfoe Thomas Reinke ended 404-346 in Thomas' favor. Thomas' sole bingo of MURALIST (anagrams: ULTRAISM and ALTRUISM) was enough to overcome Charles' STRIPED and HANGOUT.

3rd Aaron Bader finished at 3-1 +321, beating out fourth-place finisher Thomas Reinke by seventeen spread points. Aaron started out the evening having somehow secured the favor of the tile gods, as he walloped Gail Salm 627-293. In tribute to those same gods, he played four bingos: VIBRATOR, VERITIES, POUNCES and the phony ORCHELLA (ORCHILLA is new in our dictionary; the one Aaron played is Collins-only). Gail, for her part, played AWAITER and STAINERS. The rest of Aaron's games were not quite as impressive as the first, leading one to wonder what transgression he had committed in order to anger the gods. He did take down Andy Bohnsack, 391-309, thanks to finds of ALANINES and INDITES. Andy managed just a single bingo of BEATINGS [Ed. Note: there has to be way to fit that word into the narrative...nah]. Aaron's loss came against, who else, Thomas Reinke, who showed no mercy in delivering a sound 484-365 defeat.

We had a fair amount of new bingos played this week: FIREHOSE (Charles), LORNEST (Charles again), SUETIER (Gail), DREADER (Barb), and CODINGS (Sue).

Take the Top Three from Last Week, Scramble it Up, then Skip the Following Three Paragraphs

1st Thomas Reinke went an undefeated 4-0 +362 in the season's second week, putting him in a temporary tie with his brother for first place in the club standings. His nine-letter WITHDRAWS (played through AW on the board) was chosen as Word of the Week, played against Richard Lauder in the first game. Thanks to an additional bingo of LISTENER, Thomas came away with the victory, 435-414, despite Richard's counter-bingos of PRENTICE and ACTIVATE. In the third round, Thomas was matched against fellow undefeated Betty Hasselkus, and again laid down two bingos (RALLIER and CONINES) on the way to a win, 473-360. Still undefeated, Thomas and Bryan Benwitz were pitted against each other in what would be the final, culminating battle for untold glory and renown. Thomas' STEAMIE and EGYPTIAN (n. a typeface with squared serifs) glared angrily at Bryan's OLEINES and ANTEROOM, and in the end, it was Thomas who was able to put a checkbox in the win column, with the final score being 452-422. Thomas has now won 26 of his last 30 games; his four losses in that span have all been to the player who appears below him in this week's standings.

2nd Charles Reinke finished at 3-1 +428 and averaged 481 points per game, a disappointing mark after his 524 average last week. Charles got his singular loss out of the way quickly, dropping to Bryan Benwitz 371-433. Each player was limited to just one bingo apiece: INBOARD for Bryan, WACKIEST for Charles. Interesting trivia: in Charles' last twenty games, he has scored below 400 only three times, all of them while playing against Bryan. The beard must have defensive powers. In any case, Charles was fully recovered by the final two games, scoring well over 500 in both. He laid down four bingos (PELORIAN, OPAQUELY, INTARSIA, and TEENERS) in the course of a 552-375 victory over Dennis Lloyd, who got down READIED. That level of scoring was not enough for Charles, so he kicked it up a notch for his final game against Richard Lauder and won decisively, 586-299. Richard managed REMOVED and FANTAIL, but Charles was again smiled upon by the tile gods, and got four bingos of his own: ANISOLE, BETAINE, MOOTNESS, and the phony POSTROCK (PREROCK and POSTPUNK are both good).

3rd Aaron Bader again benefited from the absence of a certain Collins expert in going 3-1 +316. He used up all his mojo early with a dominating 549-291 triumph over Gail Salm, reaching that high total despite two relatively small bingos, HORSIES (73) and LAMBERTS (77). Unfortunately, neither player managed to extend LAMBERTS to FOOTLAMBERTS. Both are units of luminance. Aaron also added an entry to the "beat up on Richard" category with a 468-395 win against our esteemed director. Richard sneakily got by the phony of ASTOMAL (ASTOMOUS is acceptable, and AMATOLS is the real word in those letters) as well as the perfectly valid COLONIST, but Aaron's three bingos of AZURITE, AVENGING, and SHITTIER (gasp) were more than enough for the victory. Just like Charles above, Aaron's only loss was to Bryan Benwitz, 324-384. The bingo well ran temporarily dry for Aaron, although it did produce a little something for Bryan, who got HARTALS and RECODES.

We saw three new bingos played this week: STEAMIE (Thomas), HORSIES (Aaron), and WRISTING (Dennis).