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BGonline.org Forums
Northwestern University Students Have No Respect
Posted By: Phil Simborg
Date: Wednesday, 11 May 2011, at 5:28 a.m.
NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY STUDENTS HAVE NO RESPECT
Northwestern University student, Karem Taskim, showed up at the Chicago Barpoint Club weekly tournament last night. It was his first live tournament ever, and before the event I sat down with him and explained the basic rules of live play (shaking the dice, cocked dice, fast rolling rule, how to cheat on the score, etc.).
With 31 people in the Open division, Karem won every match to win the tournament! I am sure he has no idea how difficult it is to win a tournament at one of the toughest, largest weekly clubs in the world. We often have well over a dozen legitimate Open players and many very skilled and experienced intermediates. There are players at the club who come every Tuesday night and haven’t walked away with a tournament win in years!
Karem showed up with 3 of his fellow NW Backgammon Club teammates, and all stayed to the end to watch and cheer him on.
Last week 4 NW collegiate showed up and Stephen Bock, playing in his first ever live event, won consolation!
ABSOLUTELY NO RESPECT for their elders! Don’t they have any idea how many years of playing and study our club members have put in to become as good as we are? What right do they have to walk right in and cash in their first ever tournament?
To top it off, it’s not like these students have been playing and studying backgammon for years, in fact, most of them had no idea how to count pips, use the doubling cube, or ever heard of take points 3 months ago when the club started. Hat’s off to their coaches, David and Lyle Rubin (with some assistance from yours truly) to help provide a sound foundation and understanding of the game. I have personally recorded matches by a couple of the Northwestern team members with PR ratings of under 5.0!
Lots of credit goes to Bill Davis for providing a great venue, a well-run tournament, for offering a free entry to all first time players, and for personally giving me a tremendous amount of encouragement to bring these young people to the club and start playing live. (Some might believe Bill was not so enthusiastic about the prospect, but I immediately recognized that he was using reverse-psychology, as he was as happy and proud as anyone in the room to see so many young, new faces in the game.)
The real question is, in just a few months the Northwestern Club has taken 2nd in the Collegiate Nationals, and is starting to kick butt locally….what do they have to look forward to? Oh yes, next comes the American Backgammon Tour!
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