I played in the Milton Honey Cup tournament on Saturday. Mississauga Scrabble Club director Shan Abbasi picked me up and we arrived at the Milton Public Library ninety minutes before the start of the event, in order to set up the playing area. We got there at 8:30 and a library staff member came by moments later to let us in. Shan had arranged with the staff to allow us early entry.
Six players were in the top division and we played six games, so we had a round-robin followed by a king-of-the-hill. I finished last at 2-4 -220 and only lost nine ratings points. In spite of my lacklustre performance I didn’t feel bad even though I realized while checking my racks in the final game that I could have easily won it and ended up third.
01 387-450 Sam Hollington. I played AlCOVES (87) and ATOPIES (74) and Sam got down three late bingos in four moves: SUPERlIE (60, through my l in AlCOVES), ENDOGEn (63) and the outplay ORGANIST (70). My first bingo attempt was challenged off, TOTEMEd (82)*. I wrote down on the back of my score sheet MOzETTE but chickened out of playing it. I even told myself that “MOzETTE is a plural so it doesn’t take an -S” so I wonder why on Earth didn’t I play it if I knew that. MOzETTE would have fit. That rack also makes MOfETTE. After I played ATOPIES I was ahead 367-327 yet drew the awful EIIILRY and knew that I could not hold onto the win. Sam then scored 39 to take him to 366. I played LIRI (20) and then Sam played out with ORGANIST from an O, which had to be the initial letter. I could not have won if I had forgone playing LIRI and chose to play OILIER instead from that O. Supposing I did, then after OILIER my score would have only gone up 12 or 14 (as I cannot precisely remember where the O lay). Thus my new score would have gone to 378 or 380. My leave would have been IY. Sam’s final rack was AGINRST and he would have had numerous places to score highly with his S. I do not even think I had a place to go out with IY as I was looking all over the board for places to try to go out with EIY (after playing LIRI) if by some chance Sam missed ORGANIST. Only two letters would help me go out with EIY: P (for YIPE) and T (for YETI). In reviewing this game I believe I erred in giving Sam 14 points from my remaining tiles of EIY instead of 12. One of my racks was AAMMPP? and the shortest steal for those letters is wAMPuMPeAg. I managed to play through it, scoring 51 for PIMPED.
02 400-429 Lloyd Mills. The return of Lloyd to the tournament scene. Shan was thoughtful to call me early today before leaving to inform me of Lloyd’s presence and how I felt about playing him. I had no problem and if Lloyd decided that he didn’t want to play me, I would happily accept the forfeit win. We did not exchange any words other than the required Scrabble game talk. I played SENORITA (77) and Lloyd played COtERIEs (74), LIBERATE (61) and TRASHING (78). I unsuccessfully challenged his PIANISM (22) which meant Lloyd got an extra turn. His next move scored 28, and I ended up losing by 29, so maybe the game was winnable if only I hadn’t challenged. Regardless, the scores would have been a lot closer even if I still lost.
03 455-408 Agnes Kramer. I played rETINOID (77) and OrGANISE (82). That second blank meant that there were 8 R’s on the board (six as R and two as r). Agnes played ETESIAN (72) and SPRINTEr (80, to my r in rETINOID). The r in rETINOID was on the lower left TWS and thus hooking it with a front C- was not possible.
04 462-409 Arie Sinke. I opened with PENANcE (72) and also played HEAVIEST (70) and I bingoed out with REELING (76). I also played QUEY for 62. Arie’s bingos were ETHYNES (85), EnCAENIA (86) and TSARINA (77). I considered playing PENNAtE as my opening bingo but doubted myself again. Yet how did I know that PENNAtE didn’t take an -S? It puzzles me that I can doubt certain words (like MOzETTE) yet nevertheless know certain properties that affect them. Had I played PENNAtE instead, Arie would not have scored so highly for ETHYNES. He played his bingo hooking its -S onto the end of PENANcE. As the letters in ETHYNES make no 8LW, Arie would have had to overlap the ET- of ETHYNES onto the -tE of PENNAtE, to score only 70 instead of 85. Of course ETHYNES could have underlapped the -tE as well, but I do not believe Arie would have dangled an S in a TWS row allowing for an easy S-hook, should I be holding a 7LW. The remaining ten letters were ABDFLLRRSZ and I held EEGILNR. At this point the score was 364-392 in Arie’s favour. I had an unplayable LEERING or REELING and there was an I available but only as an initial letter, so LINGERIE wouldn’t fit. Arie took that I to play IZARD (17), bringing his score to 409. I could then play REELING underneath the -ARD to go out for 76. I then got 22 points for his unplayed BDFLS. Arie would have won the game if he had only played IZARDS for one extra point. He believed the bag probably held more vowels and he could use the S on his next turn. Little did he know that all three of the remaining vowels were on my rack.
05 354-546 Shan Abbasi. I played REeNTRY (75) and Shan busted the board open with AGATOiD (64), OUTLIVE (73), CLAVIERS (78) and SIERRAS (62). His opening play was CONIA (20) £ and I didn’t like it one bit. I would have known if CONI took a rear -A hook, and, in spite of knowing that Shan has often played Collins words in our games and might be confusing one such word here, I never even held him on it and let it go. Sigh. I cannot really get mad at myself though, for I played QAT as my first move, and I was able to score 46 for it by overlapping the Q on the DLS in two directions. Had I challenged off CONIA and played first, my first move would have scored only 24. So I got 22 extra points for letting his 20-point Collins word stay. I did however challenge off his Collins VOR £.
06 396-432 Arie Sinke. I played DELIMES (74) and SIENITES (82) and Arie played CERAMIST (76) and PUrLIEUS (72). I held ACEINRT and no 7LW would play yet there was an open O and ANORETIC, CREATION and REACTION would not play yet I didn’t remember ACTIONER, as that would have fit and I would have won, no question.