1st Mark Kenas enjoyed a rare 4-0 performance, the only undefeated player from a full contingent of 16 competitors. As Mark is limited, by choice, to competing only in the Collins lexicon, his only opponents are an endless cascade of Reinkes, whose combined skill means that Mark never has an "easy" game. However, it was only a matter of time until the stars aligned for an undefeated night, and Wednesday night was the night. Mark began with a 454-400 win over Thomas Reinke, getting bingos of GLADIOLE#, OWLIEST, and SATURATE. A rematch went down to the wire, but Mark prevailed again, 451-448, with bingos of FAIRIER and HORNITOS. This loss was made more painful for Thomas by virtue of the fact that he had given Mark five extra points earlier in the game by challenging a valid word - in the Collins lexicon, the penalty for a lost challenge is not losing a turn, but instead giving one's opponent five free points. Given Mark's propensity for fake words, one can understand why Thomas was so flippant with his challenges. Against Charles Reinke, Mark also did well, winning their first game 500-396 (playing SPINNEY, LIONESS, and TOUZIEST# for 131) and their second 452-415 (playing BARFLIES and ESCROLS#).

2nd Bryan Benwitz went 3-1 with a monster spread of +632 and a dizzying per-game average of 489. A first-round loss to Charles Reinke, 404-477, put him in the "losers' bracket" immediately - his bingos of SAUTERNE and DROWSIER couldn't overcome Charles' CENTARE, DARKING, RETORTS, and nine-letter UREOTELIC. UREOTELIC is an adjective meaning "eliminating unneeded nitrogen in the form of urea" and was chosen as word of the week by a unanimous vote of one. Bryan recovered from defeat in violent fashion, unelashing a hellish 631 points against Dave Kinzer, who scored decently at 318 but still lost by over 300. Bryan played SUPINATE, PELTERS, RECOINED, and DANCERS in his winning effort, although, with 631 total points scored, I think we all expected Bryan to have five or six bingos in the game, not just four. It's also worth nothing that 631 seems like it would be a record for highest score this year, but that title belongs to Mark Kenas and his 650, a mark which will be hard for anybody to top. Bryan's 421-348 win over John Bialek was more in the realm of normalcy, but then he pulled out all the stops once again to defeat Sara McLaughlin 501-182 for his second 300-point win of the night. Bryan found ZOYSIAS, COLDEST, and BATSMEN to secure victory.

3rd Richard Lauder continued his efforts to average two bingos per game, as he played 10 of them en route to a 3-1 +255 finish. His night started with a three-bingo effort against Helen Flores, playing INSOLES, MADDEST, and OGREISH en route to a 418-336 win. The bingo spigot continued to flow abundantly when Richard faced off against Ron Malzer; Richard propelled himself to a 440-338 win with finds of NOSTRILS, ERGATES, and OUTLINER. Ron, for his part, got down DETAINEE to ensure that Richard didn't have ALL the fun. A match against Charles Reinke proved to be Richard's only loss, 364-401, with his single bingo of CITREOUS not being quite enough. But order was restored when Richard plopped down another trio of bingos (NEUTRON, OUTWILE, ORIENTS) while dispatching Wendy Bialek, 431-323.