Bryan Benwitz is neither Benevolent nor Merciful

1st Bryan Benwitz had a 3-1 +373 record, but, in the absence of any undefeated players, this was more than good enough for first place. He came out of the gates running by trampling Charles Reinke in the first-round matchup, 449-366. The key to beating a Reinke often is to limit their bingoing; Bryan executed this plan to perfection by limiting Charles to just INGESTS while himself playing ADULATE, BOYCOTTS (word of the week!), and VOCALIST. He implemented a similar tactic against Andy Bohnsack at the end of the evening, with even more drastically successful results: BEELINE was Andy's only bingo, and his hopes of victory were forefcully crushed by the indomitable might of Bryan's four-bingo onslaught of AROYNTED (also can be spelled AROINTED), DIVIDERS, COMFIEST, and STEADING. Needless to say, it was Bryan's win, 526-312. However, cracks appeared in the facade of Bryan's Scrabbling excellence when he took on archfoe Aaron Bader; Bryan's record against Aaron before the match was four wins, eleven losses. The total now stands at four wins, twelve losses thanks to a low-scoring 316-351 game where the only bingo played was Bryan's STOCKER. Aaron and Bryan have now played three games in a row where neither player has broken 400.

2nd Aaron Bader was second out of four 3-1 players thanks to his +176 spread. Like Bryan, he sat down against his first opponent ready to play some serious Scrabble, and serious Scrabble he played, overthrowing Dennis Lloyd by a score of 477 to 344. His bingo list was lengthy: AGONISES, MODULATE, PENITENT, and HADRONIC. Andy Bohnsack once again got uncomplimentary mentions in the writeup when Aaron took him down 426-341. Sorry Andy. Aaron won the ever-important bingo battle by getting two (PARTIAL, GRODIEST) to Andy's one (RESOLED), proving once again that bingos are a good thing and that you should always try to play them when you have them except in certain far-fetched circumstances. Aaron's perfect night came screeching to a halt when he ran up against Peter Schmiedicke and promptly lost, 335-412. This time, it was Aaron who only had one bingo (EFTSOON [anagram: FESTOON]), whereas Peter enjoyed a wealth of bonus plays (CITRATE, HANDIEST, and INNARDS).

3rd Peter Schmiedicke's 3-1 +146 record left him thirty spread points shy of second, but 160 points away from fourth-place Dennis Lloyd, who also went 3-1. Unfortunately, Peter's four-game total of nine bingos, while impressive on the surface, actually lowered his yearly bingo average. Unlike the top two finishers, Peter endured a tough first game, narrowly beating Joe Horowitz 375-350. Joe did not manage to get a bingo down, but only lost by 25 despite Peter's RINGTOSS and COEDITED. The scoring picked up a little when Peter next found himself paired against Thomas Reinke, a game he won 467-392. A gnarly double-double of ETAMINES for 110 essentially sealed the game for Peter, who also got down ROULETTE for 74 (Thomas had RESOLUTE and INCLINES, neither of which even approached 110 points). Andy Bohnsack finally gets a positive mention here by defeating Peter 394-363 for Peter's only loss of the evening.

Charles got some sweet cash for playing a triple-triple of BURBLING for 167. He now owns the three highest-scoring bingos of the year.