World Scrabble Championship 1993

The World Scrabble Championship 1993 was the second World Scrabble Championship. The winner was Mark Nyman, representing the United Kingdom, as this was before the countries of the UK were given individual representation.

World Scrabble Championship 1993
27 August 1993 – 30 August 1993
Winner	Mark Nyman
Number of players	64
Location	New York
Sponsor	Hasbro

The first 15 rounds used modified Swiss pairing. After this, players #1 and #3 and players #2 and #4 played a best-of-five semifinal to determine the finalists while the remaining 64 players played three more games. The semifinals were followed by a best-of-five finals while the two other semifinalists played a best-of-five match to determine third and fourth place.

The first game of the finals looked like it would go Nyman's way when he bingoed with MUTAGENIC from an MU on his second play and then challenged off Wapnick's DOX. But Nyman later played a phony of his own (VERGINGS) and then got stuck with the Q while Wapnick drew both blanks and won by 38.

In game two, Wapnick drew both blanks again and won by almost 100 points, aided by the 102-point DYSURIC.

Game three was tight until Nyman played two successive bingos and went on to a 530-victory. The fourth game again started close, until Wapnick scored 212 points on three successive turns (though he missed a 107-point bingo in the process) and took a seemingly insurmountable 174-point lead. A few turns later, Wapnick had the opportunity to take a 212 point lead with HELMING, but the play would have opened a triple-triple line with both blanks unseen so he opted for a more conservative 41-point play and still led by 170. Against the odds, Nyman came back with a 50-point X play and bingos with both blanks and went on to a devastating 9-point victory.

The key point in the final game came when Wapnick, holding a blank, played STUM instead of SMUR (of which he was unsure). Nyman then bingoed with BEDAWIN setting up an S-hook on the O column. Unable to play a bingo ending in S because of his STUM play, Wapnick instead played GROANERs when he could have blocked the O column with ORANGiER. Sure enough, Nyman drew an S and played VELURES for 91 points then coasted to an easy win to become the first non-North American to win the world championship.

Complete Results

Position	Name	Country	Win–loss	Spread	Prize (USD)
1	Nyman, Mark	England	18-7	+779	10,000
2	Wapnick, Joel	Canada	17-8	+1200	6,000
3	Gibson, David	United States	16-9	+503	3,000
4	Williams, Gareth	Wales	15-10	+404	1,500
5	Saldanha, Allan	United Kingdom	13-5	+951	900
6	Felt, Robert	United States	12-6	+642	750
7	Sigley, Michael	New Zealand	12-6	+467	600
8	Schoenman, Bob	United States	12-6	+131	500
9	Spate, Clive	United Kingdom	11-7	+530	400
10	Sherman, Joel	United States	11-7	+526	300
11	Logan, Adam	Canada	11-7	+477	250
12	Morris, Peter	World Champion	11-7	+421	200
13	Nelkon, Phil	United Kingdom	11-7	+336	175
14	Lund, Richie	United States	11-7	+224	150
15	Odom, Lisa	United States	11-7	+221	125
16	Catto, John	United Kingdom	10-8	+557	100
17	Greenspan, Randy	United States	10-5	+541
18	Edley, Joe	United States	10-5	+495
19	Dennis, Di	England	10-5	+399
20	Thorogood, Blue	New Zealand	10-5	+326
21	Byers, Russell	England	10-5	+215
22	Day, Darrell	United States	10-5	+204
23	Lipton, Bob	United States	10-5	+196
24	Grant, Jeff	New Zealand	10-5	+188
25	Kaufman, Zev	Canada	10-5	+26
26	Ploysangngam, Amnuay	Thailand	10-5	-433
27	Nderitu, Patrick Gitonga	Kenya	9-6	+743
28	Graham, Matt	United States	9-6	+319
29	Jaruwan, Ong-Arj	Thailand	9-6	+274
30	Cappelletto, Brian	United States	9-6	+272
31	Ballard, Nick	United States	9-6	+168
32	Elbourne, Peter	Malta	9-6	+52
33	Warusawitharana, Missaka	Sri Lanka	9-6	+34
34	Luebkemann, John	United States	9-6	-141
35	Sim, Tony	Singapore	9-6	-164
36	Finley, Peter	England	9-6	-230
37	Nevarez, Johnny	United States	9-6	-293
38	Gruzd, Steven	South Africa	9-6	-362
39	Daniel, Robin Pollock	Canada	8-7	+463
40	Rosenthal, Joan	Australia	8-7	+62
41	Khoshnaw, Karl	Kurdistan-Iraq	8-7	-34
42	Filio, Roland	Philippines	8-7	-48
43	Cohen, Evan	Israel	8-7	-113
44	Grayson, John	Wales	8-7	-177
45	Wright, Geoff	Australia	8-7	-379
46	Chishty, Ishtiaq	Saudi Arabia	8-7	-482
47	Heaton, Ken	United Kingdom	8-7	-737
48	Raychbart, Paloma	Israel	7½-7½	-259
49	Onani, Magwanga	Kenya	7½-7½	-391
50	Butler, Lynne	New Zealand	7-8	+190
51	Neuberger, Jim	United States	7-8	-123
52	Clenaghan, Nuala	Ireland	7-8	-245
53	Benjamin, Larry	South Africa	7-8	-331
54	Lerman, Jerry	United States	7-8	-424
55	Holgate, John	Australia	7-8	-617
56	Jackman, Bob	Australia	6½-8½	-525
57	Filio, Candido	Philippines	6½-8½	-588
58	Norr, Rita	United States	6-9	-372
59	Koroda, Kunihiko	Japan	6-9	-913
60	Meghan, Eileen	Éire	6-9	-950
61	Abdullah, Raja Fuadin	Malaysia	6-9	-1205
62	Alimohamed, Amirali	United Arab Emirates	5-10	-1237
63	Roff, Lynn	South Africa	5-10	-867
64	Yeh, Winnie	Hong Kong	3-12	-896

• Semifinals
• Mark Nyman 3 – David Gibson 2
• Joel Wapnick 3 – Gareth Williams 2
• Consolation Match
• David Gibson 3 – Gareth Williams 2
• Finals
• Game 1: Wapnick 446 – Nyman 408
• Game 2: Wapnick 443 – Nyman 357
• Game 3: Nyman 530 – Wapnick 374
• Game 4: Nyman 469 – Wapnick 460
• Game 5: Nyman 417 – Wapnick 369