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NSC 2011 Commentary: Round 1

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Go to: Before the Tournament, Round 1, Round 2, Round 3, Round 4, Round 5, Round 6, Round 7, Round 8, Round 9, Round 10, Round 11, Round 12, Round 13, Round 14, Round 15, Round 16, Round 17, Round 18, Round 19, Round 20, Round 21, Round 22, Round 23, Round 24, Round 25, Round 26, Round 27, Round 28, Round 29, Round 30, Round 31, After the Tournament.


Round 1

When you get enough people in one room, things are bound to happen of an unpleasant nature. On his way here, Donald Turner (Garland, TX) had a car accident. He is alright, but he was delayed in arriving. His opponent kindly agreed to make up the game over lunch so that he didn't have to start the day with a forfeit loss.

Jason Keller (Highland Park, NJ) walked by and grimaced. He said, "I had only one bingo: SCREEDS and I wanted to act it out then and there!"

David Koenig (Silver Spring, MD) is intensely focussed on his endgame. I am focussing on his great T-shirt. A BAT Premier shirt with artwork by the Ottawa-based Jeremy Hildebrand. As I snap a shot, David plays out with RHUS and Jeff Fiszbein (South Lyon, MI) does a perfunctory endgame challenge. It is good. Dave's win. I see PASTILLE and BOURsIN and UNDERSET. David mentions the slight French theme of two of those plays.

A beautiful game is underway between Jesse Matthews (Kelowna BC) and Jim Kramer (Roseville, MN). Both of their heads were bent down, forward, in rapt concentration, or so I thought, until Jesse said, "you left me some beauties in there." Wasn't sure if he was serious or not, but is Jesse ever all that serious? Moments later, the game ended in Jim's favor, 445-361. Jesse was proud that he hung in despite Jim's early three-bingo blaze of glory: FATTeNED, RESALUTE, and rAINIER. Jesse snuck a BROILERS in between two of them, but it wasn't enough to keep him in the game. Other fun plays: COAGeNT, BOWLERS, and PELOTON. Watch enough le Tour de France coverage and this last word becomes part of the daily household chatter!

I snap a quick photo of Joel Sherman (Bronx, NY) vs. Roland Filio (Thousand Oaks, CA). They are just starting their paperwork. Roland asks me to take a photo of him with Joel and I get Joel to look up. It is a big deal to get to play Joel, I get it! Anyway, photos done, I leave them to finish their business. About 5 minutes later, their division leader, John Robertson, asks if I've heard about that game. I admitted I hadn't looked too closely, but did see them. It turns out that Joel eked out a close win and they did the paperwork, signed all the stuff, handed it in, and while they were squaring the tiles, they discovered they were one short. There had been a tile left in the bag. Joel felt very bad, because they were able to determine that it should have been his. And, had he picked that tile, they think his win would have been way less possible. Live and learn for everyone.

John Robertson, clad in his referee shirt is ecstatic in a way only a true SCRABBLE nerd can be. He said, smiling broadly, "I got to enforce rule IVE1!" I nodded and smiled politely. He went on to explain that he was most happy because he'd had a role in getting that rule clarified in the most recent rules update. Summing it up for me, he explained that player A bingoed a dubious word and player B held. Then inexplicably, player B said, I accept the play and then hit the clock, as if to say, "pass." Which of course, he did not mean. Anyway, the way the rule is now worded, the right action happened in that player B did not lose his turn.

Youth player, Kenny Hoang (Cary, NC), seeded 50th of 58 in division 4, just beat seed #1, Gene Tyszka (Mississauga ON), 408-406. Way to go Kenny!

Go to: Before the Tournament, Round 1, Round 2, Round 3, Round 4, Round 5, Round 6, Round 7, Round 8, Round 9, Round 10, Round 11, Round 12, Round 13, Round 14, Round 15, Round 16, Round 17, Round 18, Round 19, Round 20, Round 21, Round 22, Round 23, Round 24, Round 25, Round 26, Round 27, Round 28, Round 29, Round 30, Round 31, After the Tournament.



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