During a 1982 tournament in Ohio, Chris Reslock, a taxi driver from New Jersey, scored 719 points in one game.
The highest score for one play in a U.S. sanctioned tournament was achieved by Jack Eichenbaum, an urban geographer from Flushing, New York. He played ANTIQUES across two triple-word squares (with the Q on a double letter square) for 293 points.note That's 17 for the base word, plus 10 for the Q on a double-letter. Multiply that by 9 to get 243, and add 50 for a bingo for 293.
Nigel Richards winning the 2015 French World Scrabble Championship despite not speaking French. He reportedly spent just nine weeks memorising the entire French Scrabble dictionary. And to prove it was no fluke, he did it again in 2018.
When a contestant can solve a main-game word on the clue and the very first letter given, without having to draw any tiles. If that letter is on a blue or pink square, the player earns the bonus for it as well.
Chuck did this once during 1987's Game Show Hosts week off the clue "After 40 days, Noah was knee-deep in it (RAINWATER).
When a player can solve a Sprint word off the clue.
1989: Don Veccione won a $5,000 Bonus Sprint this way, solving his second word with one-tenth of a second left on the clock. He'd used up 9.9 seconds on the first word, so he had to hit the plunger immediately after Chuck said "go" in order to beat the buzzer.
1987: Paul Rouffa won an $18,000 Bonus Sprint after placing one letter in the first word and none in the second, and solving both words in 2.0 seconds. The biggest jackpot and one of the fastest wins in the show's history.
1987: Chuck Woolery played during a game show hosts week—and went on to win the Bonus Sprint, earning a total of $12,000 for his home viewer. This was aided by the fact that Chuck got the first Bonus Sprint word (MOSTEL) off the clue "He was a real Zero" without eating up any time.
January 19, 1989: Contestant Eddy Green blitzes through a Bonus Sprint with only one placed latter and a time of exactly 1.0 second. OCEANS for "They have a lot of salt in them", the O being the only letter put on the board during the round; VULTURE for "an old buzzard" off the clue.
July 18, 1989: A Scrabble Sprint time of 29.8 seconds would be a respectable time for four words for just about any contestant. Contestants Mary Hammond and Ellen Diminico blazed through their Sprint rounds in 29.8 seconds combined. Catch the epic Sprint battle here.
August 21, 1989: Champion Jacqui Calkin cements her fifth and final day as champion with a blistering Sprint record of 11.1 seconds, beating the previous mark by 2.6 seconds! She identifies COSBY without OS for "he writes comic books"; SARONG with only the first two letters for "a strapless gown"; PITCHERS for "they're often relieved" after only placing the T; and HANDSHAKE for "it's a touching experience" after only placing the H.
