Bryan Benwitz Remains Club Leader, We can Only Pray that his Reign will be Fair and Just

1st Bryan Benwitz barely held on to first place this week, beating out the second-place finisher by nineteen spread points with his 3-1 +459 record. In the first two rounds, he built a comfortable cushion of spread against the "Dave Duo" of Dave Kinzer and Dave Gilligan. First, he beat Dave K by a decisive score of 468-293, but his seemingly flawless victory was, in fact, flawed by a phony of DEMINES. DEMINER (one who removes mines) and DEMINING (the act of removing mines) are both good, but, strangely, there's no DEMINE. SIDEMEN was the valid word in the letters than Bryan played. An even more authoritative win over Dave G, 528-245, was not so shamefully marred; Bryan's trio of bingos (FEASING, ROASTED, and NOCTURNE) were all legitimate. His next game, against Thomas Reinke, was much more of a nailbiter, being only a three-point win, 415-412. But just one close game wasn't enough for a thrill-seeker like Bryan, so his final game against Aaron Bader was even closer in margin (although, being a loss, it was a less satisfactory result overall), 388-390. Bryan had EUPLOIDY (word of the week) and GENERATE (not word of the week), while the victor Aaron had just one bingo, GATEMEN (also not word of the week).

2nd Thomas Reinke averaged a neat 482 points and over three bingos per game en route to a 3-1 +440 final record. His first game was a 475-388 win over Gail Salm, whose bingos of ERASION and LUSTING weren't enough against Thomas' BUTENES, ETAGERE, and ARRAYERS. While that win displayed an alarming lack of mercy, Thomas' mercilessness was fully unleashed against Aaron Bader, whom he walloped by a score of 528-300. Of the four bingos on the board, all of them were Thomas': MOULTER, COEQUALS, LIONISED, and the triple-triple UNAKITES for 116 (the K must have been a blank). A loss against Bryan Benwitz was more evenly matched at 412-415, with Thomas' two bingos (TEABOARD and EYEHOLES) countered by Bryan's (DUPERIES and NEUROID). Then Thomas returned to his 500-scoring, quadruple-bingoing ways by easily taking down his brother Charles, 511-383 and playing four bingos in the process: DURANCES, ROSELLA, FARROWS, and ELUVIATE. Charles got INHERING and GESTATED to partially soothe the sting of defeat.

3rd Mary Becker returned the top three after a period of absence thanks to a strong 3-1 +140 showing. She began her night by beating Betty Hasselkus 418-324. Mary's play of CRAPPIE drew a challenge from her startled opponent (who knew Mary was capable of bad language?), but was ruled acceptable (Betty's bingo of SLAVING hopefully did not provoke a challenge). The next game was tougher for Mary, as she faced off against Charles Reinke and lost, 291-492. Charles' phony of DELETER (maybe he was thinking of the newly-added UNDELETE?) cast a cloud of regret over the game. However, Mary bounced back nicely while playing two-on-one in the next round, beating both her opponents to get her spread back into positive territory. One win came against second-timer Carl Skalitzky, 453-235, and the other win was a lower-scoring 320-291 match against Sue Goldstein. Mary bingoed once in each of those games, playing DISTILL against Carl and the nice find of CHIGGERS against Sue (a CHIGGER is a type of fly).

Aaron Bader also went 3-1, but his prim and proper +0 spread left him on the outside of the top three with his face pressed against the glass and looking sad.