Blog

Andy Bohnsack Has Won Nine in a Row - But No Pressure To Whoever Plays Him Next

1st Andy Bohnsack built on his 4-0 record last week by repeating the feat with a larger +432 spread.  Hopefully he loses soon, because the momentum he would build up by winning another four in a row would be impossible to stop, and we would probably have to disband the club.  Thomas Reinke was the only player to come close to ending this obscene winning streak, losing 401-402; Andy's other three opponents all lost by margins of more than 100.  Of the night's three 500-point games, two were Andy's: 527 against Barb Besadny and 521 against Peter Schmiedicke (including 176 points for SNOWLESS, an adjective we all hope will continue to describe the rest of November). 

2nd Charles Reinke went 4-1 +77, unusually low spread courtesy of Chris Vergeront, who applied a copious amount of hurt on him: 477-343 was the final score after the dust settled.  Chris played OESTRIN, POLICIES, and OUTPRICE while Charles played the lonely ENCOMIA (plural of ENCONIUM, a eulogy).  Mark Kenas made an appearance after a months-long absence, but Charles made sure that the welcome he received was not warm; the "C" twin prevailed 464-446.  That score of 446 was the highest losing score of the evening, and was the result of four bingos: RAMIFIED, LABORERS, CINERARY, and EGLATERE (n. a type of rose, also EGLANTINE).  Charles bingoed with TRUCKLED and, appropriately, MEANNESS.

3rd Peter Schmiedicke was the lone 3-1 finisher, contrary to last week, when we had four players finish at that record.  Andy Bohnsack and his triple-triple SNOWLESS were the only impediments to Peter's otherwise perfect evening.  Do not feel to sorry for Peter however, as he is no stranger to the delights of the triple-triple: his RELAPSES for 158 against Thomas Reinke also spanned two triple-word-scores.  No surprise, he won that game 433-397, also playing the word TOILERS in the process.  Thomas got down MINORCAS (n. MINORCA, apparently some type of chicken from what I can figure out from the trusty Google), but encyclopedic knowledge of various types of fowl can only get you so far in Scrabble.

Helen Flores played the word of the week, ANOREXY (same definition as ANOREXIA), which drew a challenge.  For the benefit of those who weren't with us this week, Helen has a new apple-shaped board which is certainly the most attractive board out of all of ours - sadly, it hasn't, as of yet, been as lucky as Helen would have hoped.

Dave Gilligan Asserts Dominance in Intermediates

1st Dave Gilligan went 1-1 -15 in a diminished intermediate group.  He notched the first 400-point game of his club career when he crushed Sue Goldstein 426-304.  His bingo of RECLINES only served to further his agenda of Scrabble domination.

Bryan Benwitz brings the pain and the wins all categories, highest finish at 3-1, highest average at 416, held his opponents to an average of 320, had the most bingos at 2 per game, and had the two highest game scores at 474 and 463. 

Lynda Finn finished second and played the nine letter work RESOLUTER, after earlier in the game trying the phony nine retriples* in the same spot.

Lessons Learned: If You're Playing Andy Bohnsack, You Might As Well Just Give Up

1st Andy Bohnsack was the only player not to experience the crushing, chest-constricting agony of loss, going 4-0 +396.  Three of his winning scores were rather pedestrian by his standards: 442, 442, and 408.  The fourth was anything but pedestrian, a 574-329 bomb dropped on the unwitting Bryan Benwitz.  Bryan actually outbingoed Andy, playing three bingos (AERATION, AMNIOTE, and CALORIES) to Andy's two (GREEDIER and ATTRITS).  The vast gulf in scores can be chalked up to a) Multiple 60+ point power-tile plays and b) the fact that GREEDIER was a triple-triple.

2nd Charles Reinke went 3-1 +428, a spread large enough to beat out three others who also went 3-1.  He had three bingos in each of his three wins, but only got two in his 405-442 loss versus gold-medal-winner Andy Bohnsack.  Two of his wins could be classified as blowouts: 483-309 against Lynda Finn and 509-287 against Matt Rust.   INSIDERS, PATINAE, and ENDOSTEA were played in the former while COINFER (v. to infer jointly, or a noun meaning "a misspelling of CONIFER"), BEELINES, and EPHORAL (adj. pertaining to an ephor, an ancient Greek magistrate) were played in the latter.

3rd Richard Lauder's 3-1 +306 record was impressive enough to garner third place honors.  In a shrewd move that only a veteran Scrabbler could pull off, Richard cleverly conserved all of his luck for the last game of the night: his first three games were all under the 400-point threshhold, but his last game was a whopping 569 against Helen Flores.  In that game, Richard played a dizzying five bingos, showing off decades of word study: SATINETS, EPIDOTES, GENEROUS, BROODER, and CEILAGE.  Helen got down INSULTER, bringing the total amount of bingos in the game to six.

The two other 3-1 players were Chris Vergeront and Thomas Reinke.  Chris and Charles shared bingo king honors with 11 each, while Thomas played the word of the week, VOLPLANE (v. to glide in an airplane). 

Harwinder Dowd Learns the Importance of Spread

1st Harwinder Dowd claimed first place by only 26 spread points, going 1-1 +12.  Her win came against June Scott, 371-313.

2nd Dave Gilligan also learned the importance of spread, finishing with a final record of 1-1 -14.  He earned his first win at club by beating Harwinder Dowd 373-327, playing the word SPOOLER along the way.  SPOOLER has three anagrams: LOOPERS, POOLERS, and RESPOOL.

For the second straight week, a new player made an appearance at our club.  Abhishek Anurag played in the expert division, and while he didn't win a game, he got two nice bingos: NUTTERS and SLOVENLY.