Charles Reinke Runs Amok

1st Charles Reinke extended his current winning streak to nine with his 4-0 +559 performance.  He has not scored below 400 during his ongoing reign of terror, and he averaged 472 points per game on this night.  His 537 (to Shayla Dunn's 399), the highest individual game score of the evening, was attained through bingos of CLAVIERS (n. CLAVIER, a keyboard instrument), MELANGES, and OARFISH.  Shayla made an attempt to stay competitive with BALLOTED and the creative nine-letter phony INQUESTED.  Charles also took out his latent and misplaced anger on Gail Salm, 495-248.  Gail appropriately played NASTIER as Charles got FURANOSE (n. a type of sugar) and TWINIER. 

2nd Thomas Reinke finished 3-1 +268 and built upon a streak of his own: he has now scored above 400 in 14 straight games.  He barely escaped a game against Bryan Benwitz, winning by a razor-thin margin of three points, 410-407.  Both combatants had two bingos: STUIVERS (n. STUIVER, a former Dutch coin) and OUTSAIL for Bryan, PERINEA and RESOFTEN for Thomas.  His victory against Jordan Parker was substantially less stressful, with the final score being 446-269 despite a bingo of RATTENS for Jordan (Thomas had EVENSONG).  Andy Bohnsack proved to be Thomas' downfall, soundly defeating him 502-437 in a high-scoring contest.

3rd Betty Hasselkus overcame a first-round defeat at the hands of Charles Reinke, 383-419, to win the next three and finish 3-1 +205. She averaged 415 points over her four games, more than 70 points better than her on-the-year average.  Of the three opponents against whom Betty was victorious, the most formidable proved to be Lynda Finn, who went down swinging, 408-414.  Betty got down a high-scoring REFACING to overcome Lynda's SOUTANE and RENTIER.  After that, Betty grew tired of letting her opponents stay competitive, and easily defeated both Helen Flores and Shayla Dunn (with scores of 440 and 421, respectively).  In doing that, she got down two Q bingos, REQUEST and SQUARED, proving that the Q isn't all bad.  Actually, yes it is.

Andy Bohnsack, Aaron Bader, and Gail Salm also finished with 3-1 records, but space considerations prevent us from detailing their notable accomplishments.