OXON HILL, Md. — The Scripps National Spelling Bee was rolling smoothly through the second day of its first fully in-person competition in three years. Then it transformed into the SAT.
An onstage vocabulary round during Wednesday’s semifinals introduced an element of randomness into the venerable bee, forcing spellers to demonstrate a different skill set and knocking out some of the bee’s most accomplished competitors.
Vivinsha Veduru and Roy Seligman, who tied for fourth place in last year’s bee: gone. Deetya Vuppala and Yash Shelar, the co-champions of this year’s expert-level SpellPundit online bee: also gone. All denied a shot at Thursday’s finals without spelling a word incorrectly.
“I thought it was tragic,” said Grace Walters, a coach to multiple previous Scripps champions.