Rally to Even the Score Again Crossword Clue
DAILY CROSSWORD Cavalcade
To the Signal
You'll love it when Olivia Mitra Framke takes heart courtroom.
Dominicus PUZZLE — Today's puzzle is and so packed with thoughtful touches that I worry, when unfurling it with you, that I'll leave something out. Information technology's a great solve — there are creative elements in the clues, the geometry of the grid and the little soupçon of grid art — and information technology'south perfectly timed.
This is Olivia Mitra Framke's second effort (and second Lord's day) for The Times; her first, a bit over a year ago, was also jammed with references to its theme honoree. It'southward certainly worth revisiting if you enjoyed the puzzle today; as a crossword fan I curiosity at the intricacy of Ms. Framke's constructions, and how unforced they seem.
Speaking of intricate, this puzzle is a pangram; it includes all 26 letters.
Catchy Clues
There was a lot of fun in the cluing today — I loved the ones for BAT, BEE, AVATAR, ROTTED, INNIE and TOMORROW (ruefully), amongst others.
47A: The mode this clue was worded made information technology tricky — I was surprised to find a favorite food of mine. Feeling awful? Have a FALAFEL. Here's a recipe, although I suggest y'all read it advisedly first, then run out and happily plunk downwards your money for some because falafel is pretty reasonable when calculated at price-per-cooking-step.
57A: This is a debut entry in the Times puzzle. I was thinking this might have to practice with carbohydrates (which some vegetables accept) but it's really something veggies and pasta lack: They're both NONMEAT.
89A: There are theme entries everywhere in this filigree, simply I noticed this funny piddling convergence: If you were a little dismayed trying to come up with things that are "found in clogs" in your bathtub, you might accept been glad to discover that the clogs here are of the wooden shoe multifariousness, populated by Anxiety. Crossing this clue, at 71D, is the SHOEHORN you might demand if those clogs are simply non budging.
99A: Les XX? The 1880s group of advanced Belgian artists who presented almanac salons featuring literature, music and paintings by neo-Impressionist luminaries like Camille Pissarro and Georges Seurat? Aye, never heard of it. It may be, though, that you know James ENSOR, who helped found Les 20 and who's appeared in the puzzle for years. His paintings are actually pretty interesting and modern, and he's a sympathetic effigy.
16D: A funny and original clue — a "Lawmaking yous don't want to break" is definitely the Mafia's code of silence, or OMERTA.
107D: I like Hearts and Spades, simply I haven't played many card games for 3 — perchance rummy with two other people, and good ol' grid stalwart Uno. I'd never heard of SKAT. It'southward the national bill of fare game of Federal republic of germany and information technology looks quite complicated; on the plus side, it'southward supposed to exist fantabulous for a trio.
Today's Theme
Perchance you're already a fan of the sport in question, as the title of today's puzzle, "To the Point," refers to points that you vie for in a sports contest. If you are, then hopefully you had as much fun solving this puzzle as these guys do at their jobs. If you're not, so you might feel more than like this overwhelmed boyfriend, trying to field an onslaught of incomprehensible clues.
Enough hints — information technology's tennis, everyone!
There are roughly fifteen references to tennis in today's grid, including the somewhat peripheral entries Base, Dais and ASSN (which I chose to include, in the spirit of team play), and including two unclued visual elements.
Those visual elements consist of four bubbles in the northwest region of the grid, reading clockwise B-A-Fifty-Fifty. Just to the correct of the bubbles is an odd element, a nearly consummate oval of blackness squares, with a long "handle" beneath running straight downwardly the center of the grid — a perfect grid representation of a tennis dissonance (its top is right beneath 23A; the handle ends right virtually 104A).
The clued theme entries follow the grid's mirror symmetry and appear at 23A, 25A, 27A, 31A, 94A, 96A, 109A, 43D and 46D, with a fourth dimension-sensitive revealer at 59A. The cluing for these entries is also tennis-centric; about are straightforward, a couple are humorous, only I'd exist surprised if yous could become any without knowing a little bit well-nigh the sport. They aren't cabalistic — you'd hear most watching or playing a single game of tennis, but they'd be amid a ton of other terminology, since tennis is not a simple game.
Equally an instance, let'south take 23A, "Follower of deuce." If you don't know tennis, there's a broad globe of possibility here. If you do, though, then you know that deuce refers to the moment in a game when two opponents are tied at the tiptop score of 40-40, pregnant that the end of that game is near. Either player must win a game by two points; whichever player gets that first point is said to have ADVANTAGE, as they're 1 bespeak away from winning.
The first player to win six games (or more, in a tiebreaker) has taken the set; whichever player wins the nearly sets (unremarkably either 2 of three or three of 5) has won the friction match — GAME Set up MATCH.
At 25A, there'southward a cute one: "Lot of back and forth?" This could be any sort of dispute or lengthy exchange, but in tennis, the nonstop activeness between players ("dorsum and forth") is a rally — one that lasts is a LONG RALLY. Up in the GRANDSTAND, spectators love long rallies — these are the stereotypical film scenes where everyone gets whiplash from swiveling back and along from shot to acrobatic shot.
94A, "Stadium nigh Citi Field," demands that you know a trivial of your baseball game likewise, equally the New York Mets started playing in Citi Field just a few years agone (2009 — ouch! Seems like yesterday). Nearby in QUEENS NEW YORK is ARTHUR ASHE Stadium, part of the United states of americaT.A. National Tennis Centre, which itself opened in 1997 and but recently underwent an extensive weatherproofing projection. The deep blue playing surface at Arthur Ashe is HARDCOURT, which gives a unlike feel from Wimbledon's grass and the French Open'due south clay courts, adding another cistron to consider for the athletes who play in these Grand Slam tournaments.
Arthur Ashe won the first U.Southward. Open up, which was played in Forest Hills, Queens, in 1968; he had an impeccable BACKHAND SHOT.
Mr. Ashe was likewise known for the ACE, a serve that is so overpowering information technology blows right past the player who's tasked with returning it — he had 26 in his U.South. Open win.
The placement of ACE in this puzzle, at 31A, is no coincidence — it's at the superlative of the racket, where the strings begin, if you will. At the bottom of the noise, at 59A, is the revealer of the grid: THE Us Open up, which is on now!
Information technology might be a attain, but the center of a tennis dissonance is known as the "sweet spot," where most players like to run across the (often spinning) ball for all-time contact. In this grid it sits about where the "O" lays, in the center of ADORE. "Love" is a tennis term, but as the punctuation on a nice ode to a sport, I recollect ADORE works great.
And that B-A-Fifty-L at 26A, by the way, is even spinning, another technique used by players to requite the brawl move, and make it harder to return.
Constructor Notes
Near a year ago I prepare out to create a puzzle that honored 1 of the most talented athletes of all time — Serena Williams. She had just given birth to a girl, and was expecting a return to the tennis scene in the very next season. Admittedly incredible! I figured the opportunity to run a Serena-axial puzzle may present itself.
Unfortunately, it wasn't in the stars. But Volition et al. were intrigued by the visual elements I had included in the grid, and wondered if I could broaden the theme a bit. So I figured, for The New York Times — let'due south make a puzzle about one of New York'due south biggest sporting events of the year!
The visual elements of the puzzle went through some changes: originally, the noise was closed off from the rest of the grid — a large no-no in crosswords, of form. I draft had more shaded squares than just the Brawl — two lines downwardly the middle of the racket, with Tennis RACKET spelled out within, for example. I'm pleased with how it turned out, and hope solvers will bask it every bit well! I'yard specially pleased with the fact that my championship made information technology through edits — "To the Point" acting as both a toast to the sport of tennis and a nod to the pun-tastic spirit of crosswords.
This is only my second puzzle to be published in The New York Times, besides with a cool visual chemical element involved. This feels like a squeamish follow-up, but I do hope to one day take one of my nonvisual puzzles accepted! If the next one is also visual, well, who knows. Maybe it'll just be My Affair!
In Other News
Paradigm
Fifty-fifty the Colossus gets older. We at the entire New York Times Crossword squad wish a very happy birthday to our own Will Shortz, who figures into everything we do, including tennis, as he is a principal of the table diverseness.
We look forrard to many more years of solving with Mr. Shortz, who welcomes us all as he lifts a pencil to conquer every challenge — and to challenge u.s.a..
Are You at Your Interruption Bespeak?
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What did you think?
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/25/crosswords/daily-puzzle-2018-08-26.html
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