CSW League Season 20 Recap: A Second Chance

Note: Season 19 didn’t really have anything interesting going on, so I skipped that and focused on other things, both inside and outside of Scrabble.

Introduction:

Season 19 ended horribly for me. With a result of 4-9-1 -122, I placed 14th in Division 3, expecting to be relegated to Division 4. Miraculously, a total of 4 people (DrRyanA, Irfan, ahmadthegreat and ferenc) didn’t register for Season 20 - the exact amount needed to keep me in Division 3. So, can I utilize my second chance and redeem myself once and for all? Well, let’s find out!

Game 1: It’s Not Over Until It’s Over

(Buckle up, this is going to be a long one…)

In this position against trustmeimnotabot (Anvay), I’m up 294-289 and it is me to play.

I played 3H (N)EGATION for 70 without much thinking, in fact, I was pretty proud of myself for spotting it, as I always had trouble spotting it for some reason. Turns out I had the stylish L4 NEGOTIA(TE) for 2 more, but more importantly, it doesn’t open up a 3x3 lane. According to Woogles’ Macondo Analysis, this was only a 3.7% mistake (Medium Mistake). But unfortunately, this would completely swing the tide of the game. Later when I clicked on the game, I was devastated to see that Anvay landed O1 DO(N)ARIES# for a whopping 140 points. The good news? I have an easy no-brainer play of J6 QIS for 46, cutting my deficit to only 19 points.

After Anvay’s GAUS# at 10J, I’m down 410-452 but I’m in good shape.

With 1 in the bag and an unseen pool of LLNSVVWY, I figured if I bingo here, I am very likely to outrun him in the endgame due to the lack of vowels in the bag. I opted for N9 IsOLEAD for 69, putting me at 479-452. I thought I just finished an incredible comeback, but the game hasn’t ended yet, and I drew the V. Any Scrabble player with enough experience knows the V is one of the worst tiles to have in an EG, mainly because it forms no valid 2s, even in the Collins Dictionary.

A quick puzzle for readers: Anvay is now facing this position. Down 27 points and me holding a lone V, he has only ONE winning play here. Can you spot it?

Anvay played B2 W(I)LLY for an appealing 48 points - the static analyser’s top choice, but in this case, it’s not quite enough. After a huge sigh of relief, I went out with (DE)V and snagged the victory with a final score of 502-500. It turns out, assuming optimal gameplay from both sides, IsOLEAD only loses if I draw one of the 2 V’s (so wins 6/8 times).

So, back to the original position, was there a play that guarantees a win?

Turns out, there was. 3 1-tile fishes (see below) essentially guarantee me a bingo no matter what I draw.

And even luckier for me, Anvay considered NYS#, but alas pivoted away from it. That one click would have determined if I won or lost. This game truly demonstrates the saying “it’s not over until it’s over”. Never give up on your games!

(shared with permission from Anvay)

My MI: 3.9

Opp’s MI: 5.1

(don’t worry, I promise the next ones won’t be as long as this :p)

Game 2: History Repeats Itself, Sorta

In this position against merlion, I am facing a slight deficit of 269-288 and it is my turn to play.

At first I was sad to see M8 RENTING being blocked, but then I looked for a bit longer, and found my only bingo of O1 (RE)RENTING for 83, taking a bingo lead and propelling my win-rate to 77.7%. In the end, merlion bingoes out, but falls just short as I clinch a narrow 9-point victory of 437-428.

Coincidentally, in my last article covering my Season 18 games, I also played a 9-letter bingo against merlion and won by a narrow margin of 14 points (scores were 440-426; very similar scores this time as well!). Guess this is history repeating itself, sorta.

My MI: 3.5

Opp’s MI: 6.9

Game 3: Desperate Hope In this 1-in-the-bag pre-EG situation against ralphi, I am down 369-390 and things are not looking good as my rack is consonant heavy.

The board is basically shut off in terms of bingoes, so opponent bingoing out wasn’t on my concerns list. Looking at an unseen of ?AEENTTV here, I figured my best shot would be a play that scores enough, retains my lone vowel, and hopefully I can go out next turn, and I2 DJ(I)N for 20 accomplishes that. Now I just have to pray I draw a good tile like the E (best case scenario the blank, obviously).

Unfortunately, I drew what was possibly the worst tile here - the V. I am definitely not going out with AGSTV, and after a few endgame moves, ralphi wins 423-409.

Back to the original position, could I have improved upon DJ(I)N? Unfortunately, not really. DJ(I)N, along with a few other plays such as N10 (FE)T(E)D, I3 J(I)GS all rely on drawing the blank and only the blank to win, so the game was lost for me anyway. With that being said, I still played subpar, especially making 3 large mistakes in a row right before DJ(I)N, decreasing my winning chances significantly.

My MI: 5.8

Opp’s MI: 3.1

Game 4: Wrong Direction, MI Atrocity

As the title suggests, I completely messed up this game, constantly making large mistakes, ending up with one of the worst MIs in my 20 seasons of League play.

In the following position, I am down 271-307 against Kavitaw and it is my turn to make a move.

Here I chose to simply drop my E at N10, hoping to bingo next turn with my strong leave of ADEINR. However, this was a 16.1% mistake according to Macondo. Instead, 1A RANDIE# for 32 is significantly better. I suppose this is because there is not much room for me to bingo (mainly row 15 onto the E), which after my 9 point play, he is highly likely to block and outrun me. RANDIE#, on the other hand, more or less evens out the game, and gives me extra turnover for the final blank so I can bingo later.

Unfortunately, I drew the E back, and after opponent’s play of N14 OP, I decided to dump my E again, where the top play is, yet again, 1A RANDIE#. Another large mistake, and not getting any closer to my opponent’s score.

A few turns later, I am now down 285-335, and things are still looking grim for me.

I dumped my B at G3, keeping the same 6 tiles as before. Here, Macondo says this is a medium mistake, suggesting 2B RIB for 17. This sets up my D for the D(RIB) hook, and although there was still another D and a blank unseen, at this stage I can’t score enough to come back without a bingo, so I needed to take the chances and pray he doesn’t have a tile to hook it (or a play that effectively blocks the spot, given the pool was extremely consonant heavy, with 12 consonants to 4 vowels unseen + 1 blank). RIB still only wins 21.6%, but any extra chances could make a difference here.

Not long after, I am down 76 and I essentially need a bingo to win now.

Here I made the play of M1 DIN, setting up my other N for bingoes forming QIN# and ANA/ANE. However, Macondo suggests that this is yet another large mistake. DIN wins 11.0%, while 2B RAN wins 19.0%. I could see why DIN would fail here, as opponent could easily block the lane if he has any of ?DIY out of 12 unseen tiles. However, I’m not quite sure of how RAN would work out here, maybe it has something to do with opponent overlapping QATS then providing me a bingo lane? Or me drawing the G to hook GRAN? I’m really unsure about this, at this point I was just desperate to open up a new bingo lane.

The endgame didn’t go well either, with me making one large and one medium mistake. I won’t go over it in depth here, but if you want to check it out, here is the position. To summarise, if both of us were to play optimally, my opponent would be stuck with an R, so slowplaying is better for me where I did not. Nevertheless, I made too many mistakes this game, and in the end, I ended up with one of my few >8 MI games throughout the entire league. Hopefully this won’t happen again in the future. :(

My MI: 8.1 (rip)

Opp’s MI: 5.0

Conclusion:

Overall, I finished 9-5 with a spread of +428, coming 3rd in Division 3. As a result, I promoted to Division 2 for Season 21. Huge congratulations to my friend Inverse for winning the season, he also wrote a recap article documenting his games, highly recommend checking it out once it’ll be published a few days later. For now, I’ll gladly take my promotion, and maybe, just maybe, League Recap Triple Collab in the future?!

(shared with permission from Inverse)

Statistics:

Score Average: 448.1

Turn Average: 35.2

MI Average: 4.0

Lost Endgame Points: 93 (8/14 optimal endgames [1 opp bingo out], 0 blown endgames)