WSJ (Contest) Grid: 15 minutes; Meta: 15 more 
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Matt Gaffney’s Wall Street Journal contest crossword, “Hidden Resource” — Conrad’s writeup.
This week we’re told, The answer to this week’s contest crossword is the grid answer that’s the secret seventh theme entry. The graphic for this writeup looks different than my previous ones. I’m in Singapore for work, and my older Intel Macbook died due to a hardware error shortly after landing. Fortunately: I had time to run to an electronics store and buy a new laptop (Windows 11, in this case). Not my favorite OS, but here we are.
There were six 9-letter theme entries, each containing a backwards abbreviated day of the week:
WSJ Contest – 03.01.2026
- MI[NUS]CULE: French animated series about insects – SUN
- ASTRO[NOM]Y: Field studied in a field, maybe – MON
- D[EUT]ERIUM: It’s also called “heavy hydrogen” – TUE
- MA[DEW]AVES: Rocked the boat – WED
- D[UHT]HANKS: “Oh, I shoulda known that!” – THU
- ST[IRF]RIES: Prepares chicken, perhaps – FRI
S[TAS]H is the missing entry, hiding SAT. Neat puzzle by Matt. The days of the week are in grid order, including the missing theme entry. Nice touch! Solvers: please share your thoughts.
Didn’t get it. I was sure the nine-ness of the themers was going to matter, especially with SIZE NINE in the grid. That’s such a silly answer (is SIZE [any number] fair game?) that I thought it had to mean something. But I guess the grid was very constrained with so much theme material, so crazy entries are expected.
I wonder if Matt tried to do this with shorter theme entries and just couldn’t. Seems like it should be possible. They don’t even need to be the same length, they could just be starred or something. That would have eased up the tension on the grid. But maybe that just wasn’t possible.
Welcome to Singapore. Thundery showers in the late afternoon forecasted for the rest of the week.
Spotted the ‘ore’ in theorem and was looking for similar entries until I saw the backwards sun and the rest fell into place.
Was there any kind of hint or indication we were looking for days of the week? I see how 7th fits, but Resource and weekdays does not exactly jibe. I kept looking for a Hidden Supply. My first stab was 26D DRUGS for STASH. But I doubted the WSJ would go that route. Settled for THEOREM with its “hidden supply” of ORE.
I too am at a loss to find any connection between Hidden Resource and the days of the week. Not a ghost of a chance for a solve for me this week 😕
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 3.5 stars
Hi J-
I think the “hidden resource” was the “sat” hidden backward in “stash”, and clued as a “hidden something or other”-
S
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 3.5 stars
That’s the only thing that makes sense to me. This is one of those titles that clinches the meta answer, but is no help in figuring anything out up til that point.
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 5 stars
Windows 11 blows goats.
It’s like the string section was playing a different score than the horns. Hard on the ears and not so elegant.
Hidden Resource points to the answer – Stash, but doesn’t point to finding hidden days of the week in the 9 letter answers. How are we supposed to know to look for days of the week?
The way I figured out how to look for days of the week was that the instructions implied a set of seven elements. So it could have been dwarves or sins, I suppose, but days seemed a good thing to look for.
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 4.5 stars
Found this one right off, pretty straightforward IMO. Though the hint indicates a set of seven, it was “hidden” that led me to look for backwards terms in the themers. That the title also fit STASH was tidy but no real help.
Here was my solve:
The seven-letter word may be UNSCREW.
You can get it from the initials of valid element names in order as a plausible constructing path, for example:
• U (Uranium)
• N (Nitrogen)
• S (Sulfur)
• C (Carbon
• R (Rutherfordium, if allowed)
• E (Einsteinium or Europium)
Then a grid entry containing a W
• W (Tungsten)