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By Matt Barrett
Lindenwood's first-year chess team took on one of the oldest chess clubs in the country this weekend in ten-board match versus Yale University. In its infancy, it is remarkable that LU chess stands a chance against such a famous institution and one which takes great pride in annually fielding one of the top 10 or 15 university chess teams in the country. The Yale team features perennial U.S. Championship contender Grandmaster Robert Hess at board one. They have a solid roster from top to bottom, and they were rating favorites coming into the match.
It was perhaps poetic justice that the final game of the match to finish was the at board one. With the match 5-4 in favor of LU, IM Priyadharshan Kannappan, the U.S. Chess League MVP for 2012, managed to draw Hess in exciting fashion. With both players having less than 30 seconds on their clocks, Kannappan calmly forced the draw by repetition. It was a big upset as Hess was a 250-point rating favorite. Of course, had Kannappan lost, the match would have ended in a draw. Boards two through four were victorious for Lindenwood, but that didn't come as too much of a surprise. The LU team has a very quality top five. Even missing WGM Anna Sharevich, IM Levan Bregadze, NM Nolan Hendrickson, and WIM Carla Heredia were able to pick up the slack by winning convincingly on each of their boards.
Yale has a deep team, though, so while LU expected to have an advantage on average in the top six, there were serious questions at boards seven through ten. Indeed the match came down to the wire, and while Lindenwood didn't win any of the bottom four games, a draw was all it took to clinch the match. LU got just that from Micah Losee on board seven, sealing a 5.5-4.5 victory over the historic Yale Club. There is a chance the two teams will meet again at this year's Pan-Am Collegiate Championship in December. That event decides the National Collegiate Chess Final Four, which advance to play later in the school year for the National Championship.
Lindenwood is 2-0 now, with narrow victories over Washington University and Yale. The calendar gets exciting for the school's titled players in the next few weeks as there are several big events to look forward to. There will be plenty of entertainment for chess spectators, who should tune in for the Thanksgiving Open, featuring perhaps 20 or more IMs and GMs on November 23-25. It is expected to be the biggest tournament at the CCSCSL this year. Additionally November concludes with an IM Invitational (at which IM Levan Bregadze is one of the competitors) and a GM invitational where IM Priyadharshan Kannappan begins his quest for the coveted grandmaster title.
