CSW League Season 22 Recap: The Long Awaited Triple Collab

Please note that Kh1108 will be referred to as “Kheiron” from this point on.

Introduction

A brief note: Xadreco’s parts will be in red, while Inverse’s and Kheiron’s parts will be in blue and green respectively.

“For now, I’ll gladly take my promotion, and maybe, just maybe, League Recap Triple Collab in the future?!” — Kheiron, Season 20 Recap

As of writing that sentence, Season 21 had already concluded (holy procrastination 😭), and I already knew I was promoting to Division 1. After 9 seasons stuck between Divisions 2-3, I have finally returned to the top, and for the first time in 22 seasons, the CSW League Recap Buddies are officially reunited.

Without further ado, please sit back, grab a snack, and enjoy this long read we have spent weeks preparing for. :D

Xadreco’s Games

Game 1: ADAPT

I’m up 4 points with a good rack after Inverse’s bingo, but I make a pretty good size error here.

I spotted one of my available bingoes of AIRINGS for 78 hooking (NAVARIN)S pretty much immediately, but was worried about what the play opened, AIRINGS slots the A 1 square in front of the double letter square to the middle right triple. There are a variety of high scoring tiles unseen that would mesh well with that open A, including the Hs, K, Ws, Ys, and the especially damaging Z. Because I was worried about this, I made a big overadjustment and played 10G (P)RAISING for 11 less. This play actually offers more average points per turn to Inverse than AIRINGS despite not opening the double letter - triple word combo. (P)RAISING floats the helpful I, N, and G for 8 letter bingoes, as well as the dangerous S. Also, I was unaware that PRAISING actually takes an S in Collins, so I’m essentially asking to get crushed on the triple by a big S bingo.

Besides AIRINGS and (P)RAISING, I actually missed my best play of RAGINIS in the same spot hooking (NAVARIN)S. I actually did not know this was a word at the time this game was played: I have some pretty poor and inconsistent word knowledge for being in division 1, especially because I’ve only more recently taken up more consistent and intensive studying. RAGINIS scores the same as AIRINGS but the R is much less scary than the A in that spot for words using the triple word score.

On his last turn, Inverse punished my poor play of (P)RAISING with a big bingo, even using all 1-pointers of TOASTIE# for 86, cutting my lead to 18. I’ve got a mediocre rack containing only 1 vowel, duplicated Ts, and the bingo-unfriendly W. At first glance, a play that seems to make a lot of sense is I7 TW(A)T for 14, shedding my excess of consonants and keeping my best bingo tiles for next turn, with bingoes ending in -S or -ED fitting to the left of TOASTIE#. In these positions, it’s always important to keep in mind the game score. After any of my reasonable plays, I’ll be up at least 30 points on a mediocre board. I don’t need to go all in on drawing another bingo to try and cement the win as long as I keep scoring reasonably. Given the unseen pool containing both the Q and the Z, I also need to be worried that if I sacrifice points to keep a better leave, then common 2-tile scoring plays to the left of TOASTIE# such as QI or ZE will take the lead and block my best line.

Instead of a standard play, I went with Macondo’s favorite play of L8 WR(I)TE for 24. This pushes my lead up to 42 points, rather than 32, and there are some good tiles I’d like to draw including the Z and second blank.

I’ve now drawn the blank after my previous play of WR(I)TE, but also the H and the V. I’m certainly in a good position now, up 19 points, but I’m not out of the woods quite yet. The easiest way to lock in a win here would be to play a bingo, but what’s the best option for me to play off some of my high-pointers? A standard play could be the simple I9 V(A)T for 10, holding DHOS?. Macondo suggests I would be about 45.6% to bingo next turn, but there are some disaster scenarios if I don’t draw one, such as if Inverse can hit me with a one-two punch of N6 QI for 33 and then M7 ZE for 47 forming Z(IT). The common scoring plays that affected my decision on the WR(I)TE turn will still block all my bingoes here.

If I want to use my blank for a bingo, I need to try to open a little bit more space. With this in mind, I made the top choice of 9C H(A)D for 11, holding OSTV?. With the unseen pool of EEEEIIILLNNNPQRZ, I have the last remaining front hooks to HAD in the S and blank, so any bingo ending in S will play in 2 spots. I’m 71 in 120 (~59.17%) to draw these unblockable bingoes holding this leave and opening this additional line.

After H(A)D, I drew one of my best case scenarios of the flexible EI from the bag, and that allows me to play the game ending N2 vOTIVES for 88, with no possible bingoes unseen for Inverse.

Game 2: Leaving Win Percentage On the Table

It’s essentially a tied game, as I’m only leading by 2 points.

I’ve got the clunky OUV combination as well as other 1-pointers that don’t score especially well on this board. The main two options I considered were 5E FUN for 26 and 12L FOIN for 31. I went with FUN for 26, despite its lower score, because I wanted to break up the extremely poor UV combination and block one of the easy scoring spots, while not offering much back. This wasn’t quite the right choice in this position. The scoring spot atop the A in BELTWAY is actually a much scarier spot with heavy tiles including the F, H J, and Z unseen. Even though NUV is a poor leave, the leave of INOV after FUN will not score well either. Turning over one additional tile to try to draw some better letters including the unseen blank, Z, and S is also nice here.

On my next turn, I’m already seeing some of the problems with my previous play. I've drawn even more 1-pointers and I have poor scoring options utilizing the upper right triple word score. Seeing that I redrew a U, I decided this was the right time to get rid of my V and thus played M3 VINO for 21 points. Once again Macondo has a different favorite choice: O1 UNION for 20. Although it scores 1 fewer point than VINO and keeps the V, drawing more tiles gives me a much better chance at picking up valuable scoring tiles that have an outsized importance on such a poor board for bingoing. Additionally, VINO barely obstructs the triple word score, while UNION both uses it and offers very little in terms of counterplay.

After VINO, my tiles improved, landing a big bingo with the S and a big J play and I’m now leading by 93.

The top equity play is 12K (O)HO for 27, keeping good bingo tiles, but this would be a decent sized error on this board. Given my big lead, the only thing I need to be worried about is Kheiron landing a massive bingo to the G in sOUPING, and with multiple Is and an N unseen, there are many combinations he can have using multiple 3+ pointers that could score 90 to as much as 143 points, if he one of the multiple words in the unseen pool ending in -ZING, such as FRIEZIN(G)#. Good bingo tiles won’t do me much good on this board either way, without the last S to hook NEB or IN to play into the G. 

With this in mind, I went with the play of L12 H(A)LO for 26. This play scores nearly as well as (O)HO, but most importantly takes out the bingo line to the G, while offering very few bingoes through the O, the highest scoring of which only score up to 86 points (such as IMPRIS(O)N)), which will still leave me up 33 points. Playing exactly 3 tiles here with 10 in the bag also has a small benefit in that if Kheiron bingoes immediately, it will empty the bag and give him a full rack of 7 tiles. With no opportunity for him to bingo twice on this board, this gives me a big advantage in endgame timing, especially with a clunky unseen pool including 4 I’s and BCFMPZ.

Game 3: To Take The Points or Not To Take the Points

In this position against Taurus777, I’m leading by 22 points with a good rack. 

Though my bingo of TENABLE doesn’t fit, I quickly spotted my playable bingo of 9H (R)ENTABLE for 67. I saw that there were some major problems with this play. The biggest problem is what it does to the board. Not only does it leave the top row open, where overlapping bingoes could score 90 or more points, it blows the right side of the board open as well, giving Taurus multiple good floaters as well as the extremely dangerous E in the second spot of the triple-triple. Taurus could easily have a triple-triple that instantly puts them back ahead a bingo, even if it’s all 1-pointers. If Taurus doesn’t have a bingo, the scoring spot through the E or atop the A across to the triple could easily make up a large portion of their deficit. Taurus’s last two plays of Z(I)G and MERC suggest a consonant heavy rack, likely one with either more scoring tiles or containing a blank (given that these plays are so short). This makes the open E even more dangerous.

I ended up going with the play of 1D BEATEN for 51 instead, 16 points fewer. This takes out the big scoring spot and leaves only weak bingo lines on the board, all of which will give me counterplay on the triples. Without any inference, Macondo suggests this yields 14.9 fewer points for Taurus’s next turn.

With Macondo’s inference tool, BEATEN outperforms (R)ENTABLE.

(Macondo infers that Taurus is way more likely to have: JLRSW)

With the opposite inference of a blank on Taurus’s rack, BEATEN crushes the simulation by even more.

In the actual game, Taurus had DFLOTU?, so while they would not have had a triple-triple, they would’ve had OUTFi(E)LD for 86 available. Instead, they had to settle for 5K DOF# for 38, so my 16 point sacrifice immediately yielded savings of 48 points.

Game 4: What Do You Have?

I’m in some deep trouble with only 2 tiles remaining in the bag against KoalaJ, while down 40 points.

I saw that I had a very strong scoring play of O8 DISOWN(ED) for 51, which would put me into the lead by 11. However, I was worried about the state of the unseen pool (DEGLMMRVY). Leaving just a lone N, I’m not especially likely to draw an outplay, even though I will only have 3 tiles. With the lack of open vowels to play through, I’m essentially dependent on drawing either the E or the Y to threaten outplays. This is where inference becomes important. KoalaJ just played IFS for 26 points. I figured that with such a short play using one of the only 2 unseen vowels to me before that play, they were highly likely to already have the E and occasionally also the Y. This greatly constrains what winning pathways I have. Using Macondo’s preendgame solver shows the following results:

I must draw at least one of the E or Y to have a chance to win. Since I was inferring that E was already on KoalaJ’s rack, this play would only win if I draw LY, MY, or VY, so 4/36 (~11.11%).

Feeling DISOWN(ED) was too unlikely to win in the endgame, I felt the need to form some alternative plans. I decided that a bingo was the best way to try and steal the game, and as such, I made the play of 10L (A)N for just 2 points.

Holding DINOSW, I can win if I and only if I draw the G from the bag, which yields DISGOWN(ED)# on the right side as well as DOWSING/DISGOWN# on the left. I can technically also win by drawing an E, yielding DOWNIES# in both spots, but I didn’t really consider this as a benefit given how unlikely I felt it was for the E to still be in the bag. With 9 tiles in the bag and inferring that I cannot draw an E, this play wins 1/9, so it is actually equivalent to DISOWN(ED).

It’s also worth noting that other fishes like 5A (O)W(CHE)# don’t work because there is only one spot that my bingoes can play, so KoalaJ can easily block.

In the actual game, the final 2 tiles in the bag were EL, but instead of drawing the E that would win, I drew the L. My inference of the E being out was actually wrong. When KoalaJ played IFS, their full rack was FIMRSVY. Even though this game didn’t work out how I wanted it to, I think my adjustment of my preendgame play based on my inference was a pretty reasonable one that in another game, could’ve won me the game.

Game 5: Playing My Favorite Word

Towards the end of my game with bnjy, I’m up 16 points with a great rack including the Z and the blank.

With these tiles, I’m able to hit the massive M7 LAZIeST for 116, instantly putting the game out of reach. If anyone has read my Season 20 recap, you may remember I played the very same word, LaZiEST for 120 against bnjy after having drawn Z?? on my previous pull. It seems like drawing this specific word with the Z and at least one blank is a good omen if I’m playing against bnjy.

Inverse’s Games

Game 1: Lucksack

I got off to a great start against bnjy with my opening bingo of TERATOI(D). A few turns later, I'm up 62, holding this rack.

I thought for a long time on this turn. The obvious plays here would be something like 9B BRACkET or BATChER, both for 70. However, I failed to see both bingoes, instead eventually settling with CABaRET for the same score. There was a star play here, though. It's a 10-letter word through ATE, scoring a whopping 102 points. Can you find it?

After CABaRET, I proceeded to draw unrelentingly well. After my SEGNO for 39, I got back-to-back bingos of ADVISER 80 and LINNeTS for 72, bringing me up 264 going into the pre-endgame.

Meanwhile, bnjy was forced to slog through subpar tiles for the entire game, and his pre-endgame rack of AEEEIOY didn’t help much. After a perfect endgame from both sides, I ended up winning by 254.

Game 2 - How Blind Could I Be?

In this position, I'm down 14 against Blibble but holding a decent rack. In fact, I spotted my 7 of EXTENTs almost instantly, which plays hooking (HINT)S for an insane 120 points. Instead, I played O1 TEXT for only 48 points.

No, this wasn't some brilliant calculated pass-up of EXTENTs. I was _somehow_, simply oblivious to the S hook of HINT. Thinking EXTENTs was homeless, I figured TEXT had to be my best option. While TEXT still wins 72.7% of the time due to my strong leave, the 120 points from EXTENTs would have likely sealed the game there and then.

After TEXT, things actually briefly got scary as Blibble bingoed with B1 IODATED, hooking D(JIN) in the process. The only drawback to this play was that it floated the I in a rather volatile spot in the 3x3 lane. And, fortunately, my rack of DEELNR? was exactly what I needed to pounce on the spot, as I immediately slammed down L(I)NgERED for 122. I then drew OSZ out of the bag, leaving Blibble with no bingoes in the endgame.

My best play here was obvious: 15G ZOS# for 44. Still completely unaware of the (HINT)S hook, I instead played 14D SOZ# for 35, winning by 66. When I looked at the analysis, the first thing I saw was that ZOS# was available for 9 more.

The dread immediately sank in.

Praying that I somehow misremembered my rack, I frantically clicked back to the TEXT play, only to be met with the undeniable red “Large”.

To say that I was upset was an understatement.

Part of my “mini crash-out” in our Discord group chat

In this position against KoalaJ, I made the first of many mistakes this game.

With my rack of AAETTW?, I had two sevens available: WATTApE and WATTAgE, which both play at J9 for 66. (simulation slightly prefers playing at J1 instead for 3 less). I'm not too sure what my thought process here was, but I somehow managed to whiff both bingoes, instead playing J9 TWA for just 16, a medium-sized mistake.

Perhaps as punishment for my miss, KoalaJ responded with K7 APhELIA for 77. However, I managed to equalise the score two turns later with (O)UTAsKED for 86.

Unfortunately, KoalaJ then landed the one-two punch of NEG(L)ECTS for 64 and JARVEY(S) for 56, bringing me down 61 in this position.

I have one and only one bingo here: the rather tricky IDIO(T)YPE for 69. Of course, not knowing the word, I settled on (J)OEY for 42. Even without the bingo, E(J)IDO for 39 would have been better, scoring 3 less but unduplicating my I’s.

After KoalaJ’s 14K NE, I played 15L PIE(D) holding DDEIIMP, keeping the subpar DDIM leave and worse, missing the M(NA)# hook entirely, where F3 DIMP# would've played. This scored more and kept a stronger leave. Even plays like B11 P(A)ID for 22 were far superior to PIE(D), again keeping a better leave but scoring less than DIMP#. This play wins 33.1% of the time, a tad bit less than DIMP#.

A few turns later, I'm down 31 in this tough position. The unseen tiles here are heavily skewed towards consonants (ABDEHMNOQRRRSSSTUUX).

I had one standout play here. Unfortunately, I did not come close to seeing it, instead opting for my second best play: 8A WIL(I)# for 21. This play cost me 7.8% in win percentage. Can you do better?

After WIL(I), my win% was only around 18.8%. However, in a stroke of luck, I drew DEU to my NORT leave, and after KoalaJ’s C2 BRUSH, I spotted UNDERTO(W) for 89, effectively icing the game right there and then.

Perhaps as reward for bingoing to the W, I drew the decent ANRX going into the endgame, while KoalaJ had to slog through his atrocious rack of MOQRSST. After a relatively academic endgame, I ended up winning by 58.

All of my bad decisions in this game culminated in an awful 5.1 MI. This was definitely an undeserved win, but come on, bingoes ending with W are not something you see everyday. That has to count for something!

Game 4 - A Novel Play

In this position, down 93, I made one of my proudest plays this season against Kheiron.

At first glance, the 7 on my rack, TOUSTIE, appears to be homeless. However, as I quickly considered the possibility of playing parallel to EERIEST, I saw an extremely stylish option: 13H TOUSTIE for 84, a 7-way overlap. Needless to say, these plays are exceedingly rare, so getting one down was very satisfying. TOUSTIE actually fueled the start of my comeback, as I drew a very solid rack with the blank afterwards.

Capitalizing on the lack of vowels in the pool, I made an interesting but incorrect setup of B4 W(O), creating a second bingo lane apart from the (TOUSTIE)R hook. This ended up working out well for me though, and I eventually drew an out-bingo of A3 PoRKIES to steal the win.

Game 5 - Surely Next Time…

Of all the players I've played in leagues, Taurus777 has to be my kryptonite. Going into this season, my lifetime record against him was 0-5, and things were not looking good early on as he got down the opening bingo of WARzONE#.

Regardless, I was able to crawl back in the midgame. After my bingo of SNIRTLE#, I retook the lead, going up by 22.

It didn't last for long.

After landing several medium-scoring plays, Taurus finished me off with KATI(P)O# for 36, following that up with DENARII for 76, bringing him up 136 in the endgame. While I was able to bingo out with R(E)CITiNG to trim my deficit somewhat, I still ended up losing by 50, my sixth straight loss to Taurus.

But _surely_, I’ll get him next time… right? After all, seventh time’s the charm!

Kheiron’s Games

Game 1 - Why Get Good When You Have Luck?

In this early game position, I am holding a bingo-ey rack against NASPA Grandmaster jellomochas (Alec Sjöholm).

After failing to spot any 7s on my rack (turned out there was only CEILERS, which didn’t fit anywhere anyway), I settled with 10E C(H)ISELER for 65, which turned out to be the best bingo available (both score-wise and win%-wise).

After Alec played K5 INCUS(E)S for 36, I roughly inferred that his 1-tile leave wasn’t a bingo-friendly tile, as he would have almost certainly bingoed otherwise. He was probably trying to keep the scoring pressure on me, while taking the extra turnover for the blanks with both unseen. But fortunately for me, holding ADGIOPT, I quickly found my only bingo of 6E ADOPTI(N)G for 68, increasing my lead to 90 points. Not long later I managed to fit a nice bingo of 13C (U)NFRoZEN for 73, surging further into the lead. While Alec made a very nice disconnected play of H10 (S)EI(Z)ED for 51 shedding vowels, I was still up by almost 100 points.

Turn history after 6 turns each

I drew into an unplayable bingo of TOYINGS# after (U)NFRoZEN, so now I’m facing the following position.

After failing to spot any bingoes, I resorted to 14J YO for 26 points, hoping to draw into a bingo hooking (CHISELER)S next turn with the ING combo on my rack. And while I did manage to land M8 LISTING the following turn, I unfortunately missed ST(R)OYING (which is a word I definitely know) in L8, forming 3 overlaps. The bittersweet news would be that it was only a 4.0% medium mistake, so that didn’t damage my MI too badly.

Eventually I managed to hold on to my lead, ending the game with a score of 537-392. I was very relieved to win this game, as I was standing at 0-5 in the division prior to this game (not to mention my opponent is Alec after all!). So hopefully, this would be my turning point and things would go better for me.

Spoiler alert: They didn’t.   My MI: 2.5

Opp’s MI: 1.0

Now, obviously this is a “League Recap” article and not a “Glazing Myself for 3 Games Straight” compilation, which means there will be some good and some bad. Now that we’ve covered the good, let’s move on to the bad. And when I said “bad”, I meant like, _really_ bad.

Game 2 - MI Atrocity, vol. [I lost count]

(Can this guy think of more original subheadings instead of reusing them? 😔)  

“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. :(” — Kheiron, Season 20 Recap

Well, well, well, what do we have here. A beautiful rack of AEIRRS?, the exact luck I needed to win against a player as strong as Kevin Fraley (Master title in both NASPA and WESPA). Since he exchanged to start with, it is me to go first, now let me just choose a bingo out of the many available to take the lead—

W- what???  

Ok, surely that had to have been a typo or some sort. Now kfraley was holding 7 consonants after the exchange, and was forced to exchange again. Surely second time’s the charm and I won’t pass on accident, right?

“What is he doing???” — kfraley in front of his device, probably  

No, those two passes were indeed NOT typoes. They were genuine passes, made by yours truly. My intrusive thoughts were telling me that a 64-point bingo would easily give back bingo lanes to him for \~80 points on average. However, now that I look back on it, he exchanged 5 tiles, which means his tiles were mostly random, and he is not as likely to bingo as I’d thought. Additionally, who doesn’t love some potential six-zero content? It is this mindset that contributed 2 of my MI in this game.

After Kevin’s JOW and my long subdue bingo of ARtSIER, I missed [kNEE(H)OLE](https://woogles.io/game/9tAGiRvVAE?turn=8) and [FL(A)VONEs](https://woogles.io/game/9tAGiRvVAE?turn=10), contributing 2 more MI to my total. Things were not any better, as I played [EGeS(T)ION](https://woogles.io/game/9tAGiRvVAE?turn=14) instead of the engine’s preferred choice of bESOGNI(O) (not like I would’ve spotted that), then later missing [(B)EWHORES](https://woogles.io/game/9tAGiRvVAE?turn=18) for 26 more points, didn’t opt for a [Z setup](https://woogles.io/game/9tAGiRvVAE?turn=20), followed by missing a [play from the Z](https://woogles.io/game/9tAGiRvVAE?turn=22), and finally finding a Z play but somehow missing the common English word [I(M)AGINES](https://woogles.io/game/9tAGiRvVAE?turn=26).

_(exhausted breathing)_ Wow, you made it all the way to here? Well congratulations, you have probably witnessed the worst game ever played in Division 1 in League History. A total of 8 large mistakes, 2 medium mistakes, 2 small mistakes, and only 2 optimal plays. Needless to say, this is the worst game I have played across all 22 seasons in League, and hopefully, for real this time, this won’t happen again in the future. :(

My MI: 9.4 (New personal worst in League)

Opp’s MI: 1.9

Game 3 - An UnBElievable Mistake

In this position against WESPA & NASPA Grandmaster bnjy (Ben Schoenbrun), I am down 309-350, facing the following position.

Here, I spotted C9 B(E)RMED for 28, keeping the QU combo and opening up the board to hope to score/bingo soon. However, as I, a mobile user, was placing my tiles on the board, something unexpected happened…

For the first time in 22 seasons, I typoed my play. Now instead of B(E)RMED for 28, I played the obviously worse B(E) for 7 only, keeping the board shut. All because I was rushing too fast trying to click my tiles on my phone, causing all my clicks after the first one not to register on time before submitting my play. I was devastated, as I knew I might have choked the game at that point. I should and will definitely start typing more carefully before submitting. After all, I have 10 hours per turn anyways, no one told me to rush all turns in minutes!

From that point on, I was sort of demotivated to continue the game, so I finished the game in a state of shock and disappointment. I was certainly not in my best shape, but alas, it was my full responsibility at the end of the day.

But before I end my section, we still have to answer a question: Would B(E)RMED have been the top play in that situation? Well, turned out it wasn’t. The top simming was I7 B(R)R for 23, which similar to my original plan of B(E)RMED, keeps the QU combination for future turns. While B(E)RMED itself would have been a medium mistake, I would still have a significantly higher chance of making my comeback in the game.

My MI: 4.5

Opp’s MI: 2.2   Game 4: The Other Perspective

You all have seen Inverse glazing on how he stole the win against me above, so I figured I should also provide my perspective for clarity :p  

In this position, I am holding a narrow 9 point lead against Inverse.

Now, let’s address Inverse’s previous move first. WOW. A DAMN 7-OVERLAP BINGO? I THOUGHT THE BOARD WAS SHUT FOR BINGOES! While I laughed it off initially, I now have to take the game way more seriously, as my lead was cut from 93 to 9 in 1 turn. The unseen is also extremely consonant heavy (?CCDEIKNPRSWY). Here, I hoped to outscore Inverse with a play of 14A EX for 36. This also keeps a vowel in reserve.

Unfortunately, Macondo views this as a large mistake, and prefers O8 PEDLER for the same score. This seals off the most damaging bingo lane hooking (TOUSTIE)R, leaving only Column B with hooks to LAG. While this play empties the bag, I suppose Inverse just drew into 7 completely random tiles with no information for inference, so I would’ve actually had a decent chance of outrunning him here.

After Inverse’s move, it is me to play, and only now did I realise how screwed I truly was.

Only up by 42, I realised I couldn’t outrun him immediately. I cannot empty the bag. And from his play of W(O) for 5 only, I figured he was almost certainly bingoing next turn. Here I played L11 CY(TE), leaving 1 in the bag. I figured that maybe, just maybe, that I’ll draw some miraculous bingo ending in ER hooking TOUSTIER, while he takes the bingo hooking OWO/TWO. Honestly I don’t have much to explain here, there wasn’t really anything I could’ve done here. Macondo suggests 12M CLY emptying the bag, but I inferred that he was certainly going to bingo anyways, so that wouldn’t work at all. I had to try something here.

After that, Inverse plays N12 N(ET), and me seeing a shit-ton of bingoes ending in ER hooking TOUSTIER, I figured my only chance would be to block the spot, which I did with PER, and pray that PoRKIES somehow wasn’t good (especially a friend got away with ROCKIES\* just the day before). But unfortunately for me, Inverse slams down the word, shattering my hopes of breaking the egg against him in League.

Reflecting upon the pre-endgame, EX was certainly my fault, but from that point on the game was sort of sealed anyway, and there wasn’t much I could’ve done about it. Admittedly though, Inverse also got rather lucky with his post-bingo draw of ?EINPRW, so I guess it was a mix of skill issue and luck here.

My MI: 4.0

Opp’s MI: 4.1

Wrap-Up

Well, it certainly wasn’t easy for all of us to be in the same division. My skill level and word knowledge are definitely worse than both Xadreco and Inverse, and many others in the top divisions in League. Nevertheless, I was very happy to finally return to Division 1, and while I certainly didn’t play my best, this certainly was a memorable season for all 3 of us. Perhaps, the real treasure was the friends we made along the way…

Final standings of Division 1

Stats (for number nerds out there!):

CSW League Recap Buddies forever! ❤️