A spell that wasn’t, and a schmuck: Takeaways from the spelling bee.

After 14 rounds of words like “probouleutic” and “zwitterion” and “schistorrhachis,” Dev Shah, an eighth grader from Florida, reached the apotheosis of his craft, correctly spelling “psammophile” to win the Scripps National Spelling Bee on Thursday night.

He denied the spelling community another exciting spell, outlasted the domineering Texans and didn’t sweat the schwa.

If you didn’t get to watch the final Thursday night, here are a few takeaways.

The schwa is a stone-cold killer

The schwa — the “uh”-like sound that can be represented by any vowel in the English alphabet, also known as the bane of competitive spellers’ existence — knocked out several finalists, as it routinely does.

It eliminated Pranav Anandh in the ninth round, when he substituted an “i” for the initial “e” in “querken”, meaning “to gasp”.

Two rounds later, it defeated Arth Dalsania, who switched an “a” for the “u” in “katuka”, a venomous snake also known as Russell’s viper. In the 12th round, the treacherous schwa claimed two victims: Vikrant Chintanaboina (“pataca”, which he misspelled as “petaca”) and Aryan Khedkar (“pharetrone”, whom he misspelled as “pharotrone”).

It’s hard to blame the participants, given that a schwa can be one of six letters – or none. It’s the “a” in balloon, the “e” in item, the “i” in family, the “o” in lemon, the “u” in support, the “y” in analysis and the, um, nothing for the “m” in rhythm.

The spell-off did not come true

Unlike last year, when the champion was determined by a first-ever spell-off after the regular word list was exhausted after 18 rounds, the bee didn’t need such extraordinary measures this time.

By the 14th round, the field had shrunk to two competitors: Dev and Charlotte Walsh. Dev walked over to the microphone, heard the word “bathypitotmeter” — “an instrument designed to record the current speed and water temperature at specified depths below the surface of a sea or lake,” says Merriam-Webster — and spelled it as if he recited his own name.

Walsh, meanwhile, was stunned by “daviely,” which she spelled “daevilick.”

All Dev had to do then was spell another word in round 15, and he did.

The bee turned out to be bigger than Texas

Texas contestants usually stack up to the finals, and they often win the title: In fact, four of the last seven bees were Lone Star State champions.

But of the 21 entrants from Texas in this year’s bee — more than from any other state — only one reached the final: Tarini Nandakumar, who was eliminated in the 10th round due to a vocabulary question.

In all, the 11 finalists represented much of the United States, from Utah to Pennsylvania and from Nebraska to Virginia. Four were from California, three of which were sponsored by the same San Ramon rotating club.

The lone Floridian in the final, Dev, from Largo, outside St. Petersburg, gave the state its first winner since 1999.