Missouri spelling bee headed for tie-breaker round

KANSAS CITY, Mo., Feb. 24 (UPI) -- A Missouri county said it had to halt and reschedule the final round of its spelling bee when organizers ran out of words with two competitors still standing.

Mary Olive Thompson -- an outreach manager for the Kansas City Public Library and a co-coordinator of the Jackson County Spelling Bee -- said only two students were left standing at the end of 19 rounds, and both spellers continued to successfully spell until organizers ran out of words at the 66-round mark Saturday at the Plaza Branch of the library, the Kansas City (Mo.) Star reported Monday.

Last year's spelling bee ran only 21 rounds, Thompson said.

She said Sophia Hoffman, a fifth-grader at Highland Park Elementary in Lee's Summit, and Kush Sharma, a seventh-grader at Kansas City charter school Frontier School of Innovation, breezed through the entire list provided by the Scripps National Spelling Bee, as well as about 20 extras plucked from the dictionary by local organizers.

"It was legendary," Thompson said.

Thompson said the bee will resume March 8 with a list of words pulled at random in the Merriam-Webster's 11th Edition dictionary. The winner will go on to compete in the Scripps National Spelling Bee in Washington, in May.