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Spelling whiz misses semifinals by one point
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Max Lee of Canfield competes in the second round of the 2013 Scripps National Spelling Bee in Oxon Hill, Md., Wednesday.
By Denise Dick
Oxon Hill, MD.
Max Lee missed advancing to the semifinals in the Scripps National Spelling Bee by one point.
The Canfield Village Middle School eighth-grader on Wednesday correctly spelled “rottweiler” and “blouson” in rounds two and three, respectively, but his score in Tuesday’s preliminary round, a written test, didn’t garner him enough points to move on.
“They only took 41 to the semifinals,” said his mother, Linglan Liu Lee. “When they announced there were only 41, the whole auditorium was making a moaning sound.”
Last year, more students advanced.
Max said he missed some words on the written test that he initially had correct, but went back and changed.
One of those words was “epideictic,” or designed to display.
Despite his disappointment, Max said he did his best and had fun.
“I think we’re going to stay and watch the semi- finals and the final round,” he said.
His mother said he scored 31 points, and 32 was the cutoff to move on.
“The words you see are just the tip of the iceberg compared to the thousands of words that he knows,” she said.
“We are disappointed with the results but proud of how hard he has worked the last couple years. Our family wants to thank The Vindicator, the school, friends, family, and the community for the supports and rooting for Max.”
The competition started with 281 spellers from the 50 states, the District of Columbia, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Department of Defense Dependents Schools in Europe; as well as the Bahamas, Canada, China, Ghana, Jamaica, Japan and South Korea. Contestants range in age from 12 to 14.
Contestants took written tests in round one Tuesday.
In a twist to this year’s bee, spellers also had to know word definitions. Max, 13, also aced that portion of the contest, correctly defining a “cadenza” as a “parenthetic flourish just before an important chord sequence.”
And he answered the question, “Who would be most likely to create crambo?” with “an amateur poet.”
Max won the 2013 Vindicator Regional Spelling Bee last March to advance to the national competition where he was one of 281 contestants.
He was also the champion of the 2012 Vindicator Regional Bee and made his second appearance at the national event.
The newspaper is underwriting the costs of the trip for Max and a parent.
He is the son of Dr. Tac and Linglan Liu Lee of Canfield.
Today’s semifinals will be broadcast on ESPN2 from 2 to 5 p.m. with finals from 8 to 10 p.m. on ESPN.
Max was eliminated last year in the fifth round when he misspelled resveratrol. He said last week that his goal was to do better than he did in the previous competition.
Because he’s an eighth- grader, this marks the last time he’ll be eligible to compete in either the regional or national event.