Indian American teenager Harini Logan on Friday, 3 June, won the Scripps National Spelling Bee 2022.
"By correctly spelling 22 words in the Spell-off, the 2022 Scripps National Spelling Bee Champion is #Speller231 Harini Logan! #spellingbee," the official Twitter account of the tournament posted.
Logan, 14, is an eighth-grader from San Antonio, and she beat Vikram Raju, 12, who is a seventh-grader from Denver, according to USA Today.
In the historic spell-off that occurred to determine the winner, both contestants spelled so fast that the judges had to use video recordings to decide who's the winner.
During the thirteenth and eighteenth rounds of the Spelling Bee, both the competitors failed to correctly spell two words in a row.
As a result, the judges to decided to initiate a spell-off, which was a 90-second round in which both Logan and Raju spell as many words as possible correctly.
Logan spelled 21 words correctly in the spell-off and Vikram spelt 15 correctly.
She took home a cash prize of $50,000, the Scripps Cup, along with awards from Merriam-Webster and Encyclopedia Britannica.
“It is my fourth time at the bee, and this is just such a dream — and well, I am just overwhelmed,” Logan was quoted as saying by The New York Times.
Vikram Raju, holding back tears, said that he'll be back next year. He is eligible to participate for only one more year.
(With inputs from USA Today and the New York Times.)
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