This would have
been the weekend of the Buffalo
Winter Sectional Tournament, but it got snuffed by the pandemic. On its
website, Western New York Unit 116 says the Spring Sectional, scheduled for
April 16 to 18, is still scheduled. However, on the ACBL website, all
tournaments previously listed for March and April have been erased from the calendar.
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• •
Silver points
still will be awarded this weekend on
Bridge Base Online, where Silver Linings Week continues today, Saturday, Jan.
23, and Sunday, Jan. 24. Players can win silver in their regular online games
at their Virtual Clubs.
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• •
Bridge Base
Online has teamed with the ACBL to
offer a variety of games with ACBL master points, some of which benefit local
clubs. Among the clubs taking part in Virtual Club play locally are the Airport
Bridge Club, the Bridge Center of Buffalo, Delaware Wednesday and the Lockport
Duplicate Bridge Club. More info can be found at acbl.org or bridgebase.com.
The Airport
Bridge Club is linked with the
Alliance Bridge Club, the ACBL’s largest bridge club, which offers more than a
dozen games every day. Anyone who has played at the Airport Club is
automatically a member. For more info, visit alliancebridgeclub.com or call Airport Club manager Bill Finkelstein at
603-6943.
The Bridge
Center of Buffalo offers
games at least three days a week on Bridge Base Online and the Lockport
Duplicate Bridge Club has scheduled games there on Tuesday evening and
Saturday afternoon, the same days they played face to face.
The Bridge Center
has added an open game to its Tuesday
afternoon game for players with fewer than 999 master points on Bridge Base
Online. The 999er session starts at 12:05 p.m, while the open game for all
players begins at 12:20 p.m. Winners in the open game receive large point
rewards since they are based on the total table count from both sections.
For more info, visit
the Bridge Center of Buffalo website, call 691-6201 or email acting club manager Terry Fraas at tmfraas@gmail.com.
The Delaware
Wednesday Club, which is invitational, plays
under auspices of the Bridge Center of Buffalo on Bridge Base Online at 7 p.m.
Wednesday. For info, call Ed Harman at 480-1666 or email eharmon@roadrunner.com
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• •
The East Aurora
Bridge Club has resumed face-to-face
games, the only ACBL sanctioned club in the area to hold live competition. Play
begins at 10 a.m. Wednesdays in the Aurora Senior Citizens Center, 101 King
St., East Aurora.
Director Dave Larcom
says that players have their temperatures checked upon arriving and must wear
masks. For more info, email him at dmocral@verizon.net.
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• •
Frank Stewart, whose Daily Bridge Club column stopped appearing in
The Buffalo News last fall, believes that reader sentiment can bring it back.
Feedback can be
emailed to Mike Connelly at mconnelly@buffnews.com and Margaret Kenny at mkenny@buffnews.com.
Meanwhile, you can
read Stewart’s columns at bridgefeed.acbl.org. Or find a whole Frank Stewart archive at Baron Barclay here.
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Tournament
calendar
2021
CANCELED: Buffalo
Winter Sectional – Main-Transit
Fire Hall, 6777 Main St., Amherst. Today, Saturday, Jan. 23, and Sunday, Jan.
24.
NO LONGER on
ACBL Tournament Schedule: St. Catharines Sectional – Holiday Inn and Suites Parkway Conference Center, 327
Ontario St., St. Catharines, Ont. Was Friday, Feb. 12, to Sunday, Feb. 14, then
rescheduled for Friday, March 26, to Sunday, March 28.
NO LONGER on
ACBL Tournament Schedule: Rochester Spring Sectional – Webster Columbus Center, 70 Barrett Drive, Webster. Saturday,
March 27, and Sunday, March 28.
NO LONGER on
ACBL Tournament Schedule: Toronto Easter Regional – Sheraton Toronto Centre, 123 Queen St. West. Tuesday,
March 30, to Sunday, April 4.
NO LONGER on
ACBL Tournament Schedule: Unit
112 (Rochester) 199er Tournament –
Strathallan Hotel, 550 East Ave., Rochester. Saturday, April 9, and Sunday,
April 10.
NO LONGER on
ACBL Tournament Schedule: Buffalo Spring Sectional – Main-Transit Fire Hall, 6777 Main St., Amherst.
Friday, April 16, to Sunday, April 18.
Cleveland
All-American Regional – Embassy
Suites, 5800 Rockside Woods Blvd., Independence, Ohio. Tuesday, May 25, to
Monday, May 31.
Niagara-on-the-Lake
Intermediate/Novice Sectional – Niagara-on-the-Lake
Community Centre, 14 Anderson Path, Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ont. Friday, June 4, to
Sunday, June 6.
District 5
Sectional Tournament at the Clubs (STaC) – Local clubs. Monday, June 14, to Sunday, June 20.
Southwest
Ontario Regional – Bingemans
Conference and Convention Centre, 425 Bingemans Centre Drive, Kitchener, Ont.
Tuesday, July 6, to Sunday, July 11.
NO LONGER on
ACBL Tournament Schedule: Rochester Regional – RIT Inn and Conference Center, 5257 W. Henrietta
Road, Henrietta. Monday, Aug. 2, to Sunday, Aug. 8.
St.
Catharines 299er Sectional –
Bridge Centre of Niagara, 6-2E Tremont Drive, St. Catharines, Ont. Saturday,
Aug. 21, and Sunday, Aug. 22.
Pittsburgh
Labor Day Regional – DoubleTree
Pittsburgh-Green Tree, 500 Mansfield Ave., Pittsburgh, Pa. Tuesday, Aug. 31, to
Monday, Sept. 8.
Great Lakes
Sectional – Erie Bridge Center,
1221 Grant Ave., Erie, Pa. Saturday, Sept. 11, and Sunday, Sept. 12.
Buffalo Fall
Sectional – Main-Transit Fire
Hall, 6777 Main St., Amherst. Friday, Sept. 17, to Sunday, Sept. 19.
RESCHEDULED:
Buffalo Regional – Millennium Hotel, 2040 Walden Ave., Cheektowaga. Was Tuesday,
Oct. 19, to Sunday, Oct. 24. Rescheduled
to Tuesday, Oct. 5, to Sunday, Oct. 10.
Niagara
Falls Regional – Crowne Plaza
Hotel, 5685 Falls Ave., Niagara Falls, Ont. Tuesday, Nov. 9, to Sunday, Nov. 14.
Unit 255
Sectional – Niagara-on-the-Lake
Community Centre, 14 Anderson Path, Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ont. Friday, Nov. 13, to
Sunday, Nov. 15.
District 5 Winter
STaC – Local clubs. Monday, Dec. 6,
to Sunday, Dec. 12.
•
• •
Bridge
club websites:
Click
names for links.
The
Airport Bridge Club does not have a website. For info, call 716-603-6943.
•
• •
The
Duplicate Bridge column is compiled
weekly by News Staff Reporter Dale Anderson. The print version stopped
appearing Saturdays in The Buffalo News when the pandemic forced local bridge
clubs to halt face-to-face play.
These days you can
find it in two places online. Google “Duplicate Bridge” plus the current
Saturday date and that should bring up a link to it on buffalonews.com, the Buffalo News website.
If you can’t get to
it there, go to Dale Anderson’s bridge blog at http://newsdupli.blogspot.com/
Deadline for
submission of scores and notices is Tuesday night. Email danderson@buffnews.com or dahotwings@aol.com. Office phone is 716-849-4420.
•
• •
Now a Gold
Life Master, Dale Anderson is
playing online these days and finished 2020 with a career total of more than
2,800 master points. Online play doesn’t provide as much drama for his bridge
blog as face-to-face competition, but he still writes about his quest for the
next measure of achievement, Sapphire Life Master (3,500 points), and other
bridge adventures here.
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• •
Duplicate
scores from Bridge Base Online
Week of Jan. 11 to Jan. 17
Bridge
Center of Buffalo Monday evening –
99ers. North-south, Sarmishtha and Shyam Kumar, 59.72%; Amy Habib and partner,
59.03%; Karen Dearing and Michael Metzger, 54.86%; Isabelle Banas and Donna
Saia, 51.39%; east-west, Joann and Gary Keenan, 58.68%; (tie) Peggy and Jeff
Feather, Janet and David Desmon, 57.64%; Sterling Zeran and partner, 57.29%.
Bridge
Center of Buffalo Tuesday afternoon – 999ers. North-south, Margaret Zhou and Audrey Ray, 62.12%; Susan
Cardamone and Linda Milch, 60.35%; Martha Townson and Jim Lanzo, 58.84%; Janet
Desmon and Joanne Nover, 58.59%; Rose Bochiechio and Judith Bailey, 56.31%;
east-west, Bonnie Clement and Larry Himelein, 58.84%; Rivona Ehrenreich and
Carol Roth, 56.57%; Beena and Madhav Deshmukh, 53.54%; Dorothy and Larry Soong,
53.03%.
Bridge Center of
Buffalo Tuesday afternoon – Open game. Sam Pal and Rajat Basu, 56.48%; Judy and Bob Padgug, 54.63%;
Martha and John Welte, 53.70%.
Bridge
Center of Buffalo Thursday afternoon – Under 1,500 points. North-south, Richard McGowan and Bill Rich,
63.84%; Wendy Zinman-Smith and partner, 59.97%; Sharon Wilcox and Joyce
Greenspan, 59.88%; David Schott and Larry Himelein, 56.91%; Marilyn Wortzman and
Jim Easton, 55.26%; east-west, Martha Cain and Linda Henschel, 61.41%; Gary
Keenan and Jim Hassett, 58.97%; Martha Townson and John Marvin, 56.25%; Rajat
Basu and John Bava, 56.25%; Agi Maisel and Tova Reinhorn, 56.04%; Miriam Regnet
and Jim Lanzo, 53.96%.
Delaware
Wednesday evening – Violet and Jasbeer Makhija, 57.22%; Mary Ball and Joyce
Frayer, 56.67%; Nancy Deneen and Martha Townson, 55%; John Scott and Jim Lanzo,
54.44%; Gay Simpson and Tova Reinhorn, 51.67%.
Garret Club
Invitational Monday morning – Robin
Coffin and Candace Graser, 59.72%; (tie) Linda Henschel and Elizabeth Schreier,
Susan Burns and Carol Sedita, 52.78%.
Garret Club
Invitational Friday morning – Janie’s
Game. Maureen Saab and Amy Habib, 64.81%; Susan Burns and partner, 63.89%;
Candace Graser and Martha Cain, 55.56%.
Twentieth Century
Club Invitational Friday morning – Nancy
Deneen and Cherry Searle, 71.11%; Donna Starnes and Sheila Hess, 56.11%; Fran
Schmidt and partner, 53.89%; (tie) Anne Allen and Mary Ellen Cotter, Phyllis
Wilkinson and Peggy Stock, 52.22%.
