This article was first published on Scrabbleverse on May 31, 2021.

The Curious Case of two Zs on a Championship Board. You’re playing in the prestigious 2016 Canadian National Scrabble Championship, you look down at your rack and see two Zs… what would you do?

We all know that there’s only one Z in the Scrabble tile bag, so what happened?

Here’s a clue…

The Canadian National Scrabble Championship is not just another Scrabble tournament. You don’t just play the CNSC, you have to qualify to compete against the best players the country has to offer.

And thanks to the event’s sponsor, Hasbro Canada, that means an enhanced prize pool, catered lunches, and everyone leaves with a brand new set of tiles, complete with blank tiles marked with a maple leaf icon.

You may be thinking that there was a production error when these tiles were created – but the answer is not that simple.

Let’s learn more about who was playing in this game.

Eli Shupak drew two Zs

Dave Krook didn’t even draw one Z

What do you do when something goes wrong??

The Curious Case of two Zs on a Championship Board. As soon as Eli drew the two Zs, he knew something was awry. When playing tournament Scrabble, when faced with an unusual situation (drawing two Z’s qualifies) you CALL THE DIRECTOR! And that’s exactly what Eli did.

Enter the Director

After investigating what happened by speaking with both players, the truth came out.

There was a second bag of identical tiles on the table, and that’s where the second Z came from!

Here are selected sections from the relevant rule:

IV.C.3. Tiles from an Adjacent Game 

a. If the discovery is made before the next player completes a play, the clock is stopped, the first player withdraws his/her play, the foreign tiles are returned to the proper bag, and replacement tiles are drawn as necessary. 

b. If the discovery is made at any time after the next player completes a play, and it is possible to determine, by distinguishing characteristics, which tiles came from which bag, those excess tiles should be removed and returned to the proper bag. 

c. If the discovery is made at any time after the next player completes a play, and it is not possible to determine, by distinguishing characteristics, which tiles came from which bag, the Director will check the tile distributions of each affected set, determine what tiles are missing, and attempt to make all bags right. During this process, the Director should use discretion to ensure that the contents of any of the player’s racks are not revealed to his/her opponent.

In this case, point C applies – plays had been made, and it was impossible to determine which tiles came from which bag. Which led to…

Counting the Tiles

In a situation like this, the directing team springs into action, noting which tiles have been played, then sorting out what tiles are supposed to remain in the bag. John Chew, Mad Palazzo, and Gary Sagara got it all straight, and the director’s decision was that the game would continue, with 101 tiles and two Zs.

What did the board look like after the game?

What would you have done with two Z’s?

The Curious Case of two Zs on a Championship Board.

Eli split the Zs to make more points, but having two Zs makes for some interesting possibilities:

Would you have played PIZZA naturally?

Hoped for a blank to play ZZz?

Or really have gone for it by waiting for two blanks to play the basically impossible Scrabble word PIZZAzz!?!?!

Who won the game?

Eli Shupak drew the two Z’s out of the bag in round five of the CNSC. Turns out, having two Z’s can help, as it got Eli his first win of the tournament, 442-383

If you have your own unusual game story, we’d love to hear it!

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