As Thomas Stared Into the Scrabble Board, the Scrabble Board Stared Back At Him

1st A furibund Thomas Reinke rebounded from an opening defeat with furious fury, ending up at 3-1 +618. After losing 392-398 to Bryan, he retreated into the darkest corner of his mind. What demented things he saw there, no one will ever know; all we know is that he returned, stony faced, to unleash bingo fury on his next two opponents, winning those games by a combined 500 points. First, against Darcy, he played SURFERS, ANTIROCK (adj. opposed to rock music), DIORITE, BURIALS, and SEAPLANE (anagram SPELAEAN) while scoring 611. Then, against Dennis, he played four more rack-clearers: DOZIEST, SONSIEST, ACCENTED, and PRONATED. This torrent of bingos must have had a calming affect on him; he only bingoed once against Charles, but still managed to win comfortably, 441-349.

2nd Charles Reinke came in second at 3-1 +174, failing to narrow the already narrow gap between him and his brother in the yearly standings. He started off with a 453-372 win against Gail, playing GAYNESS and the word-of-the-week, MOVIEOLA (n. a device for viewing and editing film, more commonly MOVIOLA). Gail, for her part, played two nice bingos added in the last dictionary update, DEMENTI and LORNEST. In the second round against Dennis, Charles got out-bingoed 3-1, NAUSEATE, SPLURGER, and INDICTER thrown down on the board in front of him while all he could manage was NACELLE, but still earned a close win, 398-391. Against Bryan, in the process of winning 524-346, he played the "why-the-hecking-heck-is-that-a-word" of-the-week, GOADLIKE (adj. resembling a goad, seriously, what the heck?).

3rd Bryan Benwitz, in typical Bryan fashion, went 3-1, but in non-typical Bryan fashion, only played 4 bingos while doing so, far beneath his average. His feat of toppling two formidable opponents with only a bingo per was impressive: He beat Thomas with only BORNITES for 60, and then beat Andy with only LODESTAR for 59. After losing to Charles, he beat Helen 473-332, playing OAKIEST and GREENER. In the end, he proved a known Scrabble truism: the only thing that matters is scoring more points than your opponent, and there is more than one path to doing so.

Good luck to Helen and Lynda as they venture to Phoenix (great time of year for it, am I right?) for the Word Cup, which starts on Saturday. Live coverage will be available here: http://director.victoriascrabble.org