Round 28 Commentary

Joe Cortese (pictured at left) was the Chicagoan who visited with John Ozag on Monday, whose information I lost. He ran SCRABBLE^® Club 39 at Marina City and held a tournament in 1980 that about 150 people attended: one of Chicago's first SCRABBLE^® tournaments. Joe is only playing socially these days, but perhaps seeing this event has whetted his appetite again.

"Chicago may be losing Michael Jordan, but we've gained Brian Cappelletto."

John Ozag wrote the book "The Ultimate Guide to Winning SCRABBLE^®," one of the first sanctioned books on how to play SCRABBLE^®. It came out in 1988 and sold 30,000 copies.

[board] Division 1's Chris Cree (TX) and Kathy Shuler have come over. Chris is recreating a game he played in round 27 against the one, the only, Richie Lund. Toward the end of the game, Chris held AEEIORS and he'd tracked and knew that Richie held AIONRV?. Instead of blocking the bottom lane, as most people might have. He instantly spied the possibility of the nine-letter VARIaTION through the TI on row 4. What makes experts experts is that Chris made the unusual play OSE down column f for 16 points leaving himself two out plays of AIRED or AIRER. As it turns out, Richie asked, "Did you see VARIaTION?" Chris nodded. Richie then played VAW leaving Chris both out plays. He chose AIRED for 8, winning the game by 102 points. Kathy suggests that I mention how cute Chris is. Well, as the reception picture shows, Chris *is* cute.:) (see board)

Division 1 computer guru Howard Turkenkopf tells me that Bob Prentiss beat Ann Sanfedele with a 600-368 game.

Steven Alexander reports that Jesse Wornum (Division 3) was playing a tight endgame. The game ended and he saw that he lost, because he was over on his clock. His oppenent, not seeing the clock, congratulated him on the win. Instead of just agreeing to her oversight, he pointed out his clock. It was 1 second over. She exclaimed that she thought he had one more second left, but he assured her it was one second over. Good sportsmanship, for sure.

Division 4's Jean Lesch, who had been 1-26 (and that win was a bye), beat Beatrice Klepczarek in a tight game: 298-287. Way to go, Jean! In a heartbreaker of a loss, Ellen Levine lost to Jacquelyn Fyr, 431-430.

-- Sherrie Saint John, Internet Reporter, NSC98

HASBRO is the owner of the registered SCRABBLE^® trademark in the United States and Canada. © 2008 HASBRO. All rights reserved. "SCRABBLE^® Brand Crossword Game" is the proper way to refer to this unique group of word games and related properties marketed by HASBRO. "SCRABBLE^®" is not a generic term. To use it as such is not only misleading but also does injustice to the company responsible for the trademark's longtime popularity. All we ask is that when you mean SCRABBLE^® Brand Crossword Game, you say so.

The SCRABBLE^® trademark is owned by J.W. Spear and Sons, PLC, a subsidiary of Mattel, Inc. outside of the United States and Canada.

For more information about SCRABBLE^® or the NSA, or to comment on or correct the contents of this page, please e-mail: info@scrabble-assoc.com
To report technical difficulties in reading this page, please contact webmaster John Chew at: jjchew@math.utoronto.ca