M-A exited the Mechanics’ Institute Scholastic Chess Championship in San Francisco on March 30th with a 2nd place ranking team-wide, with senior John Diepenbrock, sophomore and Club President Shawnak Shivakumar, and Sahil Shivakumar winning first place trophies in their respective divisions. This performance is a step up from previous tournaments, and sets a competitive stage for the 2024 M-A Chess Championship planned for mid-May.
On the edge of Golden Gate park in the heart of San Francisco, competitors flocked to the San Francisco County Fair Building for the annual competition. The tournament drew in over 300 participants from all grades and skill levels. Of those 300 were eight members of the M-A Chess Club.
Shawnak and freshman Hayden Brongersma competed in the K-12 1000+ ELO rating division; and freshmen Leonard Isakov and Benjamin Wilbur, sophomore Axel Pilette, juniors Arman Azadpour and Arman Loftman, and senior John Diepenbrock competed in the 9-12th grade unrated division. Sahil Shivakumar, Shawnak’s younger brother, also played in the tournament in the 6-8th grade Unrated Division.
Each player competed in four rounds of chess games, where a win would earn one point, a draw would earn half of a point, and a loss would earn no points. Teams were scored based on its top four scoring players. Any ties by the end of the tournament would be decided by the strength of the opponents the tying players or teams faced. The top six games in the 1000+ division were displayed in real time on chess.com, and still are now.
At 10am, the teams were ready for their first round. The first round proved their own strength, with four wins placing M-A’s team at the top of the team brackets, but also the strength of the competition, with a nine-way tie for 1st place. Hayden’s first game was exemplary of this, a fierce struggle in which he was losing for most of the game, but made it to a position where he could agree to a draw with his opponent, earning 0.5 for his first round.
The second and third rounds clarified the scores. Shawnak sweeped as expected and remained undefeated in the tournament. He wasn’t alone, however, as Diepenbrock also won all three of his games. Isakov nearly did too, before losing in the third round to end with a comfortable two points. Brongersma and Wilbur were not to be underestimated either, ending three games with a win, tie, and loss for 1.5 points each.
By the end of the round three M-A had a combined score of 9.5 out of 12. With one round to go, the team knew a comfortable win would require 14 points but the best they could do at this point was 13.5. That would only happen if Shawnak, Diepenbrock, and Isakov all won their next games, and either Brongersma or Wilbur won theirs.
The M-A team went cautiously into their final games—except for Azadpour and Loftman who were assigned to play each other. Pilette won his final game and said, “Everyone executed. Even the people that were not contributing to our [team score] still played a great game.”
Brongersma, Diepenbrock, and Isakov won their games. Shawnak’s match was running long, and both players were running low on time. The computer was confident Shawnak was in a winning position, but he didn’t know that. All he knew was that his team depended on his victory. After his opponent missed a flaw in his own defenses, a computer-analyzed ‘great move’ sacrificing a knight to win a rook was all Shawnak needed to turn the game from barely in his favor to a foregone conclusion.
As the M-A Chess Club exited the playing hall, the mood was high. They had done what they needed to do; Shawnak and Diepenbrock had gone undefeated, Isakov took three games, and Brongersma finished with a strong 2.5, putting the team’s score at a competitive 13.5. All four players that had participated in the Bay Area Chess tournament four months prior performed better in this tournament, with exception to Shawnak, who was undefeated both times.
Then, the awards came. Sahil took the first place award in the 6-8th grade unrated category. When the 9-12th grade unrated section came up, three M-A players received awards: Pilette took tenth place, Isakov took sixth, and Diepenbrock received the first place award in the category. In the 1000+ rating category, Shawnak took 1st place, narrowly beating out 2nd place by the half-point that Brongersma took in his draw.
During team awards, anticipation rose alongside the rankings, until M-A’s name was finally announced. 2nd place was the reward for their collective struggle, tied in points with 1st place, an elementary school team that butchered the 3rd-5th grade unrated category.
Shawnak said, “More than just the result is the fact that everyone came together on a Saturday morning and drove to the city. We had a great time, and we got a lot of new people playing and engaging with chess. That is the biggest victory.”
The M-A Chess Club previously played in the Bay Area High School Blitz Championship, where they won 4th place as a team, and plans to host the M-A Chess Championship in mid-May, after AP testing has concluded. For more information, go to https://www.instagram.com/mahs_bears_chess/ or attend a club meeting in D-20 every Friday at lunch.
Brian Hoyle is a member of the M-A Chess Club
