For the second year in a row, the Scripps National Spelling Bee ended in a tie, as 14-year-old Gokul Venkatachalam and 13-year-old Vanya Shivashankar both got to take home a trophy.
The two were crowned co-champions after the list of 25 final round words was exhausted. The eighth graders went head-to-head for 10 rounds before nailing their final words, according to the Associated Press.
Shivashankar's final word was "scherenschnitte," a German word meaning the art of paper cutting design. Other words she spelled in the head-to-head round include zimocca, Bruxellois, and myrmotherine.
Going last, Venkatachalam spelled the word "nunatak" — which is derived from Inuit and means a hill completely surrounded, but not covered, by glacial ice. He had previously tackled words such as paroemiology, nixtamal, and pyrrhuloxia in the championship round.
SEE ALSO: WHERE ARE THEY NOW? The successful lives of past National Spelling Bee champions
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