December 5-8, 2003

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Back to 2003 Canadian SCRABBLE Championship Live Coverage

2003 Canadian SCRABBLE Championship Commentary: Round 18

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, Award Ceremony, Final Round 1, Final Round 2, Final Round 3, Final Round 4, After the Tournament.

David Boys (Dorval QC) beats Evan Berofsky (Thornhill ON), so it's David Boys (Dorval QC) vs. Dean Saldanha (Richmond BC) for the championship tomorrow.

round 18

After John Chew made the pairing announcements, the players set to play their last game. It felt serious in the room. At board 1, Evan Berofsky (Thornhill ON) vs. David Boys (Dorval QC) and at board 2, Bernard Gotlieb (Cote St. Luc QC) vs. George MacAulay (Saskatoon SK). Dean Saldanha (Richmond BC), Gibsonized by the special pairing rules in effect, played Vince Castellano (Fairfax, VA) at table 3.

I bop outside the room for a moment and catch Ron Hoekstra (Kentwood, MI) doing jumping jacks in the next room. He said, "natural caffeine!" Way to go, Ron!

At table 19, Diane was Brenda Megannety (Toronto ON) open with BEATERS for 76 against Anita Rackham (Mansonville QC). Other bingos on their board: Brenda's RESORtED through the R for 66 and Anita's FANFARES through the R for 88 and MAgENTA for 77. Final score, 423-363, Brenda's win.

Doing things "his way," Trevor Sealy (Oshawa ON) wants to talk about a round 17 game now. I'm flexible. News is news, right? He said, "there is no luck, but bad luck sometimes, huh?" I nod and he goes on to explain that he and Stuart Levinsky (Thornhill ON) met up in round 17. They both had lost all their games today and agreed that one of them would be a bit happier after their game finished. So, in his first rack, Trevor overdrew and had 8 tiles. They stopped the clock and Stuart looked at three tiles, opting (no shock) to toss a blank back in. Well, the hoot is that even with the blank taken away, Trevor bingoed with SNAKING! On his very next play, Trevor played FLOGGERS and he remembers at least one or two more bingos for him. He cannot, however, remember any of Stuart's plays other than to remark that Stuart got both blanks late in the game and that he made a low-scoring bingo with one of them. I sat there, pen poised, waiting to get the word Stuart played or some more definitive tidbit when Trevor, with 17 pieces of paper in his hands all upside down and backwards and confused looked up at me and said, "I'm not doing a very good job of this, am I?" I chuckled and told him he was doing fine and asked happened to see Stuart walk by at the moment. Stuart, emeshed in his current game, was not in a mood to talk, so I slinked back to my keyboard and finished some photo IDs.

Albert Hahn (Calgary AB) comes over and says, "well, I warned her this would happen." I like how he does this, starts conversations in the middle like that. I took the bait and said, "warned who?" He said, "well, earlier today I spied the two players who had the best legs in the room and I said to the other one, 'you watch, I bet we of the best-legs-in-the-room end up playing each other today.' And we are." So much in so little, I realize in one fell swoop that Albert has defined himself (in shorts in 10 degree F/-30 degree C weather outside) as one of the two with the "best legs" and glean that the other is the miniskirt-wearing Maddalena Palazzo (Richmond Hill ON). Sure enough, I'm right. I get a photo of them with their legs hanging out and after the game ask whose legs were "better." Mad admitted that Albert had more "winning" legs than she did. Albert was tickled at a play they combined to make. Mad bingoed with RASCALS and he later added BE to the front for BERASCALS for 36 points!

I'm flagged over to check out a Zev Kaufman (Toronto ON) vs. Ray Francis (Pickering ON) game. Ray says, "Zev opened with four bingos in a row an very nearly almost lost this game." The explain that Zev's first four plays were: HORDEIN for 80, PERINEAL to the L for 70, STrAKES for 79, and NOTARIAL though the second A for 59. Inbetween those plays, Ray played HASTILY for 88, JOB for 29, and FIX for 43. Then Ray got down GLOZES for 48, WEARY for 52, and CAVE/AWEARY for 47. Not liking that WEARY front hook, Zev challenged and the play came back acceptable. He ended picking up and getting stuck with the Q, but still managed to win by 18 points, 468-450.

At table 5, Andrew Golding (Verdun QC) and Tony Leah (Ajax ON) had a good game. With WOMEN on the board, ?IR was put in front and extended to the triple for aIRWOMEN for 36. I see Tony's LOAThING for 64, DERNIER for 69, and EREPSIN for 78. The game grew stair-step-like toward the upper left side with MOB, ZAX, JET, HILT, and KAE going up like a staggered stair toward the upper right corner of the board. Late in the game, Andrew reports that Tony had his tracked and saw Andrew's play before he even saw it himself. By placing the letters RESO in front of JET, he not only created RESOJET, but OZONE, too. Nice bonus!

The annotated game between David Boys (Dorval QC) and Evan Berofsky (Thornhill ON) will be upon the site soon enough, but suffice it to say that David Boys (Dorval QC) defeated Evan Berofsky (Thornhill ON) 401-269. They talked for a long time afterwards and shook on the result at the end. It will be Dean Saldanha (Richmond BC) vs. David Boys (Dorval QC) finals tomorrow!