1st Charles Reinke started off the new year (and the new Scrabble club season) right with a solid 3-1 +308 record. If his new years' resolution was to average two bingos per game, he's off to a good start, having played eight bonus plays in his first four games of the year. However, his theoretical new years' resolution of winning every game of Scrabble that he plays is already a failure, as he lost his round two matchup against Thomas Reinke by a tight score of 426-432. Thomas had a pair of uncommon bingos, CUTOUTS and FOGEYISM (the latter for 118 points), while Charles punched back with INBREEDS and ALGORISM. The loss was avenged in the following round, where Charles came out victorious in both of his two-on-one battles. He took out Sara McLaughlin by a score of 491-258, but barely clawed his way to a 371-368 win against Dennis Lloyd.

2nd Thomas Reinke likewise started his club season off with a 3-1 record, but his +250 spread relegated him to second place. His best game was a 473-274 affair with Dennis Lloyd. A 134-point DAIDZEIN was a nice find for Thomas in that one, and also one of the highest-scoring non-triple-triple plays in this writer's memory. Thomas seemed poised for an undefeated evening, but ran up against Bryan Benwitz in the third and final round, losing 407-410 despite outbingoing Bryan two to one (PINIONS and STYLISE for Thomas, BARRELED for Bryan). Also of note was Thomas' nine-letter BRUNETTES, played against Sara McLaughlin, which brings his lifetime total of 9-letter-plus bingos up to 48.