Scrabble Adventures

Well, I finished in 27th place with a record of 17-14 (+234). Not great, but not too bad considering the lack of preparation leading up to the tournament.

Having played at my second national tournament, here are some "lessons learned":

• Stay calm: In several games, I would fall behind but managed to pull out a win because I stayed calm and played the tiles that I had. No need to panic if your opponent opens with a bingo or plays a high-scoring word.
• Study word hooks: On a few occasions, I wasn’t able to capitalize on opportunities because I didn’t know the front/back hooks to words well enough. For example, I knew DUI doesn’t take an S, but I couldn’t remember DUIT. That cost me an opportunity to lay down a bingo and take advantage of a TWS and block my opponent from scoring at the same time.
• Minimize low scoring plays: After looking at several of my games, I realized that the winner had the fewest low scoring plays. By "low scoring", I mean <10 points per play. These low value plays can come back and haunt you.
• Try and score 30+ per turn: As a follow-up to the previous point, I took Shaun Goatcher’s past advice about trying to maximize each turn and score an average of 30 points per turn. If you don’t, winning becomes that much harder.
• Check the bag for tiles: On two occasions, there were incidents involving tiles at the end of the game: one was a "missing tile" that fell on the ground and the other was a tile left in the bag. Check the bag to make sure it is empty! Also, look around to see if any tiles were inadvertently dropped on the floor.
• Have fun: Seems like a no-brainer, but I realized that it’s important to have fun. Scrabble is a game and should be enjoyed.

While the above hold true for playing in the tournament, the one major lesson I learned is that I need to study. Hanging around other players (especially Kevin Turner) made me realize just how poor my word knowledge is. Here’s to my goal of studying 30 minutes each day.

The next two national championships are in Dallas. Hope to see you there.

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