Question

Put the Scrabble board aside and just concern yourself with the 100 tiles. Using those tiles, what is the longest list of names of States of the United States you can create? No crossing words or sharing tiles between States, just try to spell out as many of the State names as you can. Blanks may be designated however you wish. Spaces in State names may be ignored. If you think you have the longest list possible, then try to maximize the total number of tiles used as well.

For example, one could start with:

but NEW HAMPSHIRE could not come next unless one of the blanks was used as the 'H' (NEW hAMPSHIRE) since there are only two actual Hs in amongst the tiles. Here is my personal best so far:
  1. IOWA
  2. UTAH
  3. IDAHO
  4. TEXAS
  5. NEVADA
  6. ARIZONa
  7. FLORIDA
  8. GEORGIA
  9. VERMONT
  10. ILLINOIS
  11. KENTUCkY
  12. NEWJERSEY
This uses 77 of the tiles.

Answer

I will post results as I receive them. Following the notation suggestions will help post any submitted results more quickly.

A Simon Lengyel sent me this list (using 'District Of Columbia'): 12 entries, 91 tiles.

  1. UTAH
  2. IDAHO
  3. TEXAS
  4. NEVADA
  5. OREGON
  6. GEORGIA
  7. VERMONT
  8. DELAWARE
  9. ILLINOIS
  10. KENTUckY
  11. NEWJERSEY
  12. DISTRICTOFCOLUMBIA

This uses 91 of the tiles.

And omitting D.C.:

  1. UTAH
  2. IDAHO
  3. MAINE
  4. TEXAS
  5. FLORIDA
  6. GEORGIA
  7. VERMONT
  8. COLORADO
  9. KENTUCkY
  10. LOUISIANA
  11. NEWJERSEY
  12. WESTVIRGINIa

This uses 86 of the tiles.

Luke Pebody sent me this list with 13 states:

  1. IOWA
  2. OHIO
  3. UTAH
  4. IDAhO
  5. MAINE
  6. TEXAS
  7. FLORIDA
  8. GEORGIA
  9. VERMONT
  10. DELAWARE
  11. ILLINOIS
  12. KENTUCkY
  13. TENNESSEE

Dr. Pebody then sent me this follow-up: 
Full analysis:

 There are 9 ways to make 13 state names out of a full scrabble set.
 There are 0 ways to make 14.

The following 6 names must appear:
 MAINE, TEXAS, KENTUCKY, FLORIDA, GEORGIA, UTAH

The following 13 names are the only others that can appear:
 ILLINOIS, NEVADA, NEWJERSEY, OHIO, IOWA, TENNESSEE, OREGON, VIRGINIA,
 COLORADO, MISSOURI, IDAHO, VERMONT, DELAWARE

The 7 of these 13 that appear in the 9 methods are:
 Worst (79 tiles)
  IDAHO, ILLINOIS, IOWA, NEVADA, NEWJERSEY, OHIO, VERMONT
 Next Worst (81 tiles)
  DELAWARE, IDAHO, ILLINOIS, IOWA, OHIO, TENNESSEE, VERMONT
  IDAHO, IOWA, MISSOURI, NEVADA, NEWJERSEY, OREGON, VERMONT
  IDAHO, ILLINOIS, IOWA, NEVADA, NEWJERSEY, OREGON, VERMONT
 Better (83 tiles)
  DELAWARE, IDAHO, ILLINOIS, IOWA, OREGON, VERMONT and TENNESSEE/NEWJERSEY
 Even Better (84 tiles)
  DELAWARE, ILLINOIS, NEVADA, NEWJERSEY, OHIO, OREGON, VERMONT
 Nearly Best (85 tiles)
  DELAWARE, ILLINOIS, MISSOURI, NEVADA, NEWJERSEY, OHIO, OREGON
 Best (86 tiles)
  COLORADO, IDAHO, IOWA, NEWJERSEY, TENNESSEE, VERMONT, VIRGINIA

So, it seems we have definitive answers.
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