Tampa middle schooler wins Scripps Spelling Bee

Bruhat Soma, a rising eighth grader at Turner/Bartels K-8 School in New Tampa, took first place in the century-old Scripps National Spelling Bee Thursday in Washington, D.C., after a rare spell off.

Bruhat, 12, smiled broadly when his name was announced. He was showered with confetti and handed a multicolored trophy.

“I’m really excited,” he said before his family joined him onstage. “It’s been my goal … and I’ve been working really hard. Now I can’t describe it, I’m still shaking.”

To reach the timed “spell off” against Faizan Zaki of Dallas, Bruhat had to spell habitude, indumentum, dehnstufe, Okvik and Hoofddorp. He had to define sine qua non.

This was the third year that Bruhat took part in the competition.

According to his biography on the website, Bruhat enjoys reading and snare drums. He also plays basketball. In an interview shown on the show, he said, “if I practiced basketball as much as I practice spelling, then, yeah, I could play basketball in college or high school.”

He is the second Tampa Bay area student to succeed at the spelling bee in recent years.

In 2023, Dev Shah of Morgan Fitzgerald Middle School in Pinellas County won the competition with the word “psammophile,” which means an organism that prefers or thrives in sandy soil.