Niles North Chess

Successful Tournament Preperation

2009-10-22T22:33:00.004-05:00

Hey guys it's Ilan. I wrote a paper for my English 101 class about preparing for a chess tournament and I wanted to share it.
An Unorthodox Approach to Preparation

When a veteran chess player attends a tournament, the player is usually ready to compete. But what does this really mean? Some people might say “He got enough sleep the night before or he played chess the other night.” There are also those who believe, “He doesn’t need to study, he’s naturally smart.” However, none of these hypotheses are entirely true. In order for a chess player to be ready to compete at an optimum performance, there are several grueling steps he or she must endure.
As a former professional player and chess expert, I found out playing solely chess as a means of preparation before a tournament is not sufficient. Usually, a couple of weeks before a tournament, the training begins. Examining previous tournament games helps identify the player’s weaknesses and areas of improvement. A math student studying for a final would go back and review previous quizzes and go over any incorrect problems so that on the final the student would be fully prepared. The same goes for chess, but it’s trickier. Identifying and fixing one’s own mistakes is difficult to accomplish. On many occasions, a player would have a training partner or use a computer engine because mistakes aren’t easy to spot in the higher levels of chess. Therefore, when a mistake is made from a game and a player knows how to correct it, it is sure that it won’t happen again. Thus, going over games is one the best ways to improve in chess and definitely a sound technique to tournament training.
Game databases are also very helpful. A database is a collection of tournament games played by chess players; a typical database would comprise of around four million games. A chess competitor would attempt to get as much information about opponents as possible through their game history. Players study their opponents’ games and look at their repertoires, what openings have given them trouble in games, their strengths, any signs of novelties, and style of play in terms of tactics and strategy. Being able to master these concepts requires a lot of time and commitment, but the time spent off the board is worth it because it could decide the outcome in a match. The logic behind this is a player is analyzing for hours with the aid of computers and partners to spot potential weaknesses in his or her opponent, something that is not available during a game and that an opponent will not able to refute during a high pressured tournament game. By going over opponent’s games a chess player will be able to surprise them in the opening and play a style against theirs which results in a successful tournament preparation and will raise your chances of winning.
Once a player has gone through his or her games and has reviewed any opponent’s games, a player sums up the chess training and reviews remaining components: tactics, strategies and endgames. This is usually done by reading chess books, taking private lessons, or watching lectures. Finally, after countless hours of studying, usually one would play some practice games before the tournament. Each practice game takes around three to four hours to get used to the tournament time control setting. However, a tournament game can take up to seven hours. Also, the day before a tournament a player shouldn’t do anything chess related and should just relax. I would not recommend six hours studying the day before, because it could potentially result in a terrible start. It’s as if you’re studying all night for a midterm and when you take the test you’re almost sleeping. It is important to get rest before the game begins.
In addition to the chess training, it is also important for a player to be physically ready. Playing six hour games takes a big toll on the body. Some argue elite chess players have comparable physiological parameters to those who practice sports such as car racing, shooting and golf; consequently, according to Roberto H. Baglione, a head of the Department of Nutrition at the National Sport High Performance Center, “physical activity done on a regular basis, specially aerobic, may help the chess player in many ways: It makes body posture better, improves resistance and helps improve emotional state. Also it can reduce anxiety, depression, and stress, and can improve cognitive performance, all of which are essential for success on the chess board.” In my personal experience, this holds true as well. In the winter months when weather is monotonously inclement, in the Chicago area it is difficult to stay fit since the outdoors are not available. As a result, this could explain the reason why I perform at a lower level in the winter months. However, when spring and summer comes along, I have some stronger results because I am able to stay fit and in good physical shape. Therefore, being physically active is an essential part of the chess player’s tournament preparation regime.
Furthermore, an ideal preparation would also include maintaining a proper diet. Eating well is no nutritional novelty. Many suggest vitamins and minerals can improve memory, concentration, focus and overall optimism. In addition, fish oils are becoming very popular among chess players due to boosting a person’s memory. In chess, having a good memory is important because chess players memorize many opening variations and tactical themes. Also,during the tournament smart players would avoid the concession stand as they are filled with junk food and soft drinks. Instead, it is advisable to prepare a meal before hand, or if time permits, dining at a healthy restaurant is also a good alternative. A few years ago, I didn’t have enough time to get a proper meal because my next round was starting promptly, so I had a “cheat meal”: pizza with chips and a coke. About two to three hours into the game I felt terrible and my concentration oozed away from the 64 square board. Although coffee is not considered healthy, it can help chess players. Some players drink coffee before rounds to help them keep going which has helped me in the past in some of my longer matches that ended up finishing as late as 1 AM. For the ideal tournament preparation, a good chess diet is essential for success.
Chess is seen many times as a game that only intellectual individuals can prosper in. This statement is indeed false; the preparation determines the success. Many of the elite chess players follow variations of this tournament preparation guide. Preparing for a chess event might take a lot of commitment and work but the end results are worth the training. I can vouch for this theory because due to this intense preparation procedure, I have represented Illinois at National Championships and have played for a professional chess league.

Niles North Beginning of season...

2009-10-16T00:40:00.004-05:00

This school-year is a huge year for Niles North Chess. With one of the best all-around teams in state we hope to make a big run at state and come away without getting upset. We are led by our Superstar National Master Eric Rosen, Saagar Gupta, Fedya Titov, and Michael Chinitz; all highly rated players. Our bottom is structured by Tom Valente, Evan Speigel, Chad Hirsch, Adil D, Qazi, Ben Marks, Justin Braddy, Evan G.

We now need to focus on our weaknesses. Board 5-8. We want to win our games with them, and enforce it with our top boards. We would like to make every game 68-0. That is our goal. We want no excuse at state. We don't want to be the Chicago Cubs. We want don't want to be the Yankees. We want to be the Patriots.

Frosh David Paykin won $750 at Midwest Class
Sophomore Eric won $400 at Midwest Class as well
Eric Rosen won $1300 at US open along with winning against a GM and drawing against one.

Niles North Preparation Slogan: Our mating season is year-round.

-Saagar Gupta
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Niles North Chess Summer 09

2009-06-29T14:45:00.002-05:00

“The road to success is always under construction” - Lily Tomlin

Niles North chess has always successful, but NNHS has only won 1 state-championship. For some reason we can not finish. That is our plan this year. With the loss of the legend, Ilan Meerovich, we will know have to rest upon Sophomore Eric Rosen.

Our Line Up->

Top Four:
Sophomore Eric Rosen (2150+)
Senior Fedor Titov (1748)
Junior Saagar Gupta(1663+)
Junior Michael Chinitz(1739)
--- (Till tenative)
Chad Hirsch
Justin Braddy
Evan S.
Glen Ko.
---
Thomas Valente

Ben Marks
Adil D.
Evan G.

As long as our bottom four study, we should have a team all over 1500 :)

My the best team win!

Niles North, State, and the Pursuit of 1st.

2009-02-09T14:57:00.004-06:00

In the coming days arrives the IHSA state championship. A championship where people compete for the top place.

Conference Championship

2009-01-31T13:33:00.003-06:00

Ilan vs. Cohen 0-1
Eric vs. Dubin 0-1
Fedya vs. Robby Hectch 1-0
Gupta vs. Kent cen 0-1
Chinitz vs. Kenny 1-0
Justin vs. Long haired kid 1-0
Chad vs. Peter 1/2-1/2
Evan vs. Sam 1-0

State line ups. Stevenson vs. Niles North vs. IMSA

2009-01-23T18:03:00.003-06:00

Stevenson vs. Niles North vs. IMSA
1. Cohen vs. Ilan vs. Aakaash
2. Dubin vs. Eric vs. Feng
3. Robby vs. Fedya vs. Ethan Leng
4. Kent Cen vs. Chinitz vs. Matt Castillan
5. Jimmy? vs. Gupta vs. Jack Shi
6. Kenny vs. Justin vs. Victor Duan
7. Cheryl vs. Chad vs. Evan Adcock
8. some dude vs. Evan vs. Kirthi Banothu or Ray Gu

I was bored during chess club, as usual. lol

Need to add Whitney Young people.

I just know this from past tournaments n talking on facebook/icc.

Meet vs. GBS, Conference update, and Raiders Tournament

2009-01-19T22:41:00.003-06:00

We had a nice meet against GBS. Both of us were missing our top board. I don't know if there board 1 is going to play at state though. As Ilan was missing we all were moved up. This game was up to our bottom boards with a little comfort of my win on board 3. We pulled it out in the end as Fedya drew to win it.

We are number 1 in our section in conference. We are 7-0! Hopefully the momentum can go into state/conference play-offs!

Raiders Tournament was a fun tournament. We got to face some of the average/decent teams of the tournament. We did not get to play IMSA, or Whitney but it was ok. This is the reason why I hate playin 4 round tournaments. The top players/teams don't get to play each other and there is many undefeated. It also doesn't help for placing (1st,2nd,3rd, etc) since it solely depends on tiebreaks. All in all, it was a 1st place finish!

Time to study for state!

Frosh Soph, Senior/Junior

2008-11-23T10:07:00.005-06:00

When I thought about this tournament I was thinking about IMSA vs. Niles North. We were the stronger schools in this tournament. However this tournament was different. It is freshman and sophmores team (excluding seniors and juniors since they had their own tournament.) If we had to play a actual 5-board game, the lineup will consist of (+ resulted outcome)...

Rosen (2108) vs. Aakaash (2000?) 1/2-1/2
Gupta(1441?) vs. Feng (1800?) 0-1
Chinitz (1550) vs. Victor Duan 1-0
Chad Hirsch (1298) vs. Jack Shi (1300?) 0-1
Evan+ more vs. Kirthi? Idk.

Award winners:
Tied for 1st (2nd place on tiebreaks) Board 1 Rosen
Gupta 4th place board 2
Chinitz 1st place board 3
Chad 4th place board 4
Evan 3rd place board 5

I would like to say my game vs. Justin Feng was intense and provided good expierence for me. I was pretty much winning the whole game, and then since I thought so much to win, I lost in the final seconds when I couldn't calculate a way for forced mate.

Congrats to Ilan Meerovich for winning Senior section. Congrats to Fedya and Glen for placing 2nd and 4th(?) respectively in the Junior section.

Congrats to IMSA, and this is bad for our team as Mr. K says no more Bughouse till we get 1st. :)

Saagar Gupta

Evanston Tournament

2008-11-04T18:26:00.001-06:00

I don't know where to start. Somehow we managed a 2nd place finish but it seemed much worse than that. It told us a lot. One can make a case that we didn't have some players in team section including Ilan (2122 USCF) and me (1441 USCF) but that is not right. Our wins were not convincing and our team loss to Stevenson was something that we need to address. We are probably one of the few teams that can contest Stevenson's line-up and probably the only one that can beat it. I thought IMSA had a really good match up with them but it didn't go IMSA's way either.

Looking ahead, we have a whole boat load of time to prepare, and maybe a few OCB outings later we can compete for 1st at state or nationals.

Wish us (Saagar, Chad, Evan and Hunter) luck as we play in ICA All-State tomorrow. So stay tuned!

Saagar

Bumble .... H.S. Tournament...

2008-10-25T22:49:00.004-05:00

(name is a inside joke from Ilan)

This was a exciting win for our team. We tip our hats to IMSA, as we almost saw the win as impossible before the last round. But chess is chess, and impossible is nothing (like when I got mated when I had 3 queens vs. 1 queen at Chicago open.) We pulled off a great comeback with a full 5.0/5.0 last round (I believe). I enjoyed playing my opponents and found my game against Aaakash Meduri (1902 USCF) a very good experience.

We took 12 people with us and 11 finished with a over .500 win rate...

First starting off with our 3 new freshman who came with us: Ninos, Gwon (S.P.), and Amir.
Each did extremely well especially Amir with a score of 3/5. This is the first time our team as met Amir (Mr. K saw him messing with the switch in the bathroom and then asked him if he played chess rofl.)

Sophmores and Juniors did extremely well. Many of them got 4/5s including Justin Braddy, Fedya Titov, Gupta, and Evan Speigal. Chad, Glen and Hunter all suffered a hard loss in one of their games and the expierence gained from it is priceless.

Top 2 players (Freshman + Seniors). Congrats to Eric and Ilan for tieing (along with others) for first place with perfect scores. Eric however won the tournament due to tie breaks.

Well congrats to IMSA, Neaqua Valley, and thanks to the wonderful T.D.s./Helpers. Also thanks for the wonderful host Bloom H.S.

-- Saagar Gupta

2008-2009 Niles North Chess

2008-10-09T20:53:00.003-05:00

After both a disappointing state but a very successful nationals NNHS chess is ready for this year. With the loss of 3 great seniors: Oscar, Ben, and Igor. We have to step it up to get first at state and nationals. As of right now we have 10 players (not including new Freshman) and only 8 boards. There maybe a fight for a spot.

We went to Nationals in Atlanta, Georgia, and here is how we did.

Awards at Nationals:

Individual:
Ilan Meerovich 5th place (K12 Championship section)Saagar Gupta 2nd place (unrated section)Fedor Titov 2nd place (Under 1400 K12 Championship section)
Justin Braddy tied for 3rd place(Under 1400 K12 Championship section)
Chad Hirsch 15th Place (u1200 section)Evan Spiegal tied for 30th (u1200 section)

Team: 3rd place (K12 Championship section)

25th place (u1200 section)

Tournaments:

http://www.niles-hs.k12.il.us/harkyr/ChessWebSite/NN_Chess/Chess_Meets/NN-Tourn-Sched-08-09.htm

More coming soon!

Niles North -Evanston meet

2007-11-17T22:00:00.003-06:00

NN - Evanston
12 0
11 0
5 5
0 9
4 4
7 0
6 0
2.5 2.5

47.5 20.5

Bloom Trail

2007-11-04T12:26:00.000-06:00

Niles North attended the annual Bloom Trail Knights of the Round Table tournament this weekend. We took 14 players with us and the tournament was a lot of fun. Here are results from our players:

Freshmen
Chad1/5
Atif- 2/5
Evan - 2.5/5
Hunt- 2/5
Mike(Austin)- 4/5

Sophomores
Ashour-1
Cabbage-4/5
Fedya-4/
Glen-3 /5

Junior:
Ilan 5/5

Seniors:
Oscar- 4.5/5
Ben 5/5
Sherwin 2/5

Igor 3.5/5

Here are a couple tactical exercises that appeared from Niles North players:

tactic 1: Meerovich-Kirsch Should white be worried about Qb6+ winning the pawn on b2?

tactic 2: Rothschild-Liang What would you play as white in this position?

* All pictures from www.chesscoach.org

2007-10-30T21:16:00.000-05:00

Hey guys,

Sorry for not posting in a very long time. Since my last post we have already had 2 meets and a major tournament. Here are some of the highlights.

Midwest Class 2007

This tournament was held at the luxurious Doubletree Hotel in Oak brook. A number of chess players from Niles North attended including Glenko,Fedya,Mike(No clues),Oscar, Igor, and myself. Oscar and Igor had a great tournament, both scoring 4/5 points. Oscar made $100 and went from 1359-->1421'; Igor made $175 and went from 1582-->1612. The sophomore's did okay, but I feel like they do not take these 40/2 SD1 tournaments seriously. All together I think our team did very well. Also I didn't do too bad either. I won $700 in the Masters section and went from 2057-->2124. I think with these kind of results from our chess team, we might have a good shot at maybe top 10 in state.

Meet 1- Niles West
Our first meet we swept.. 68-0

Meet 2 - GBS
We scored 43-25 I think. GBS played very well, and put a good fight. We lost on boards 2,4, and 8.

Upcoming plans?

We have a meet this Friday versus New Trier.

Also this coming weekend we are going to the Bloom Trail tournament.

Here is a list of new chess players this year:

The Freshmen: Hunt,Evan, Atif , No clues, Chad, Moe and some others I don't remember.

The Sophomores: Ashour ,Matt,Atif

No new juniors

The Seniors : Solomon and Sherwin

NNchess is back!

2007-07-25T00:45:00.000-05:00

I apologize for not blogging in a while, but since the state tournament the team has sort of forgot about this blog. Just to summarize what happened since then here are some events Niles North participated in..

State 07(Peoria)- 3rd place
Nationals(Kansas City) -8th place team(!!)

Individual winners that placed..
-Unrated:Cabbage and wolf man clinched 1st and 2nd.
-Bughouse:1st place Ilan Meerovich with Daniel Mc Nally(Main South)

Wow... Was that a while ago!

Also the chess team participated at the prestigious Chicago Open tournament.

Igor Fortel made $2,000 in the u1500, While Ben Rothschild had a great tournament in the u2300 section.

Now that summer is upon us, the team is studying hard to improve next year at the state tournament. We hold summer chess nights at Niles North on Wednesday which last usually a good 3-4 hours. Although we graduate 4 seniors(Joseph Liu, Ninoshka Fernandes, Ruses Patel, and Mike Thariath) we get a strong freshman. Michael Chintz , Tony, and some other people. Thus we are still one of the top contenders for the state tournament.

To end this post, I want to post our current USCF ratings, to show the progress and the lack of progress in our players:

Board 1-- Ilan Meerovich 2048
Board 2-- Ben Rothschild 2034
Board 3-- Michael Chinitz 1475
Board 4-- Igor Fortel 1580
Board 5-- Oscar Miranda 1359
Board 6-- Cabbage 1158
Board 7-- Glen Ko 1235
board 8-- Wolf Man 1224

** This board order is not accurate and may change.

I will add another post around late August, and from thereon we will post much more as the season begins.

Have a great summer, Ilan Meerovich.

NSCL Conference

2007-02-03T22:21:00.000-06:00

Niles North attended the conference playoffs this past Friday, February 2nd, and competed with three other teams: Stevenson, Carmel, and Maine South. The Vikings had a convincing win over Stevenson first round (64-4) whilst Maine South beat Carmel (44-24) in a close match. Thus, the Vikings, defending the state title, would play Maine South in the championship match. Ilan Meerovich and Igor Fortel won on boards 1 and 6, respectively, but Maine South won on boards 5, 7, and 8. Ben Rothshild, who was winning in his game, managed to let his opponent sneak away with a draw on board 2. With roughly 10 accumlative minutes left in the match, Joseph Liu, board 3, and Mike Thariath, board 4 were still playing their games. The score was 24.5 - 24.5, and Michael Thariath was in a completely drawn position whilst Joseph Liu was losing in his game. After the draw was established on board 4, the score was 29 - 29. With minutes remaining on the time control of both players on board 3, Joseph Liu made a remarkable comeback and even had winning chances, however, because of the time control, a draw was established. With the tournament match tied 34-34 at the end, a blitz sudden death was initiated to determine the clear winner. After some even more intense moments, Joseph Liu, on board 3 with the last game going on, called time on his opponent, and Niles North won the match 35 - 33. Congratulations to all who participated in the traditional playoff match, and the state tournament this weekend will be quite interesting with close matches like these!

Results
Round 1
Niles North Stevenson
Board 1 12 0
Board 2 11 0
Board 3 10 0
Board 4 9 0
Board 5 4 4
Board 6 7 0
Board 7 6 0
Board 8 5 0
Total 64 4

Results
Round 2
Niles North Maine South
Board 1 12 0
Board 2 5.5 5.5
Board 3 5 5
Board 4 4.5 4.5
Board 5 0 8
Board 6 7 0
Board 7 0 6
Board 8 0 5
Total 34 34

Results
Tiebreak Blitz off
Niles North Maine South
Board 1 0 12
Board 2 11 0
Board 3 10 0
Board 4 0 9
Board 5 8 0
Board 6 7 0
Board 7 0 6
Board 8 0 5
Total 35 33

->to be edited soon // more details

Studying Hard!

2007-01-28T13:15:00.000-06:00

Hard at Work on Friday Night

Upcoming plans for the NN team

2007-01-23T23:40:00.000-06:00

With conference in ten day and state in less then 20 days the Niles North team has begun taking chess into more of a serious level, making sure there will not be a repeat of what happend last weekend against Whitney Young. Our whole team is preparing very hard and hopefully it will pay off as Niles North winning state back to back years. What happens after state? Well our team is thinking of attending the Nationals tournament in KC,and possibly the Chicago Open. Right now though, we are more concerned about State!

- Ilan Meerovich

West Chicago Team Tourney

2006-12-17T20:39:00.000-06:00

Niles North recently played in the West Chicago Team Tournament and placed first out of about 20 teams. However, we played many tough teams, facing off against Glenbard South (15th at State last year), Illinois Math and Science Academy (16th in State), and Whitney Young (3rd in State). Igor Fortel (Bd 6) , Thomas Dykes (Bd 8) and myself (Ben Rothschild) went 4-0 on our boards, placing first in our sections. Joseph Liu (Bd 3) and Oscar Miranda (Bd 5) went 3.5-.5 also placing first for their boards. Our team has been working hard and we are all glad it's paying off. Our last round against Whitney Young was the most challenging with almost everyone's game being a long hard struggle. Ilan Meerovich's annotated game against Kayin Barclay (2045) is posted below and was extremely tactical and challenging. Here are two puzzles below (one is from one of my games) which are both black to move and win. Good luck and post the answers if you find them.

Annotated Game

2006-12-03T22:01:00.000-06:00

This was my game on board two against Evanston last friday. This was the first time that we had been able to play with our state team because not everyone had been able to make the previous ones. I was glad with our overall performance winning 52-16.

Rothschild,Ben - Demashek,Elliot [C06]Evanston Meet

1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nd2 Nf6 4.e5 Nfd7 5.Bd3 c5 6.c3 Nc6 7.Ne2 cxd4 8.cxd4 f6 9.exf6 Nxf6 10.0-0 Bd6 11.Nf3 0-0 12.Bf4 Bxf4 13.Nxf4 Qd6 This is all theory. Qd6 is a less common move where Ne4 is mainline which can lead to complicated positions. 14.g3 My other option here would be Ne2, with the idea of bringing the night to g3 and playing Re1. The text move secures the night on a strong central square along with gaining control of some of the darksquares. 14...e5!? Possibly too early. This type of move can be risky because it isolates blacks d-pawn which can be weak. [ 14...Bd7 15.Re1 Rae8 16.Ne5 would be a little safer although more passive. ] 15.dxe5 Nxe5 16.Nxe5 Qxe5 17.Qb3 g5? Diagram

18.Rfe1! Winning at least a pawn. 18...Qd6 19.Nxd5 Nxd5 20.Bc4 Bh3 [ 20...Rd8 21.Bxd5+ Qxd5 22.Rad1+-; 20...Rf5 21.Rad1 Be6 22.Rxe6 Qxe6 23.Bxd5 Rxd5 24.Qxd5+-; 20...Be6 21.Rxe6+-] 21.Bxd5+ Kg7? 22.Qxb7+ Kh8 23.Re7 Qg6 24.Be4 Bf5 25.Bxf5 Qxf5 26.Rf1 h5 27.Qc7 Rf6 28.Qe5 Qg6 29.Rd1 Raf8 30.Rd6 Kg8 31.Rxf6 Rxf6 32.Qd5+ Rf7 33.Qxf7+ Qxf7 34.Rxf7 Kxf7 1-0

Currently, there are three teams in our conference that are 4-1. Maine South beat us, New Trier beat Maine South, and we beat New Trier. So the top two teams with the most points will make it to conference. Next week we are playing North Ridge Prep. Maine South is playing GBS and New Trier is playing Evanston.

Meet 5 (Niles North @ Evanston)

2006-12-02T02:40:00.000-06:00

Niles North
Board 1: Ilan...............12
Board 2: Ben...............11
Board 3: Joseph..........10
Board 4: Rasesh..........0
Board 5: Mike.............8
Board 6: Oscar............0
Board 7: Igor...............6
Board 8: Ninoshka......5

Final Score: Niles North - 52 Evanston- 16

mmmhm

Meet 4 (New Trier @ Niles North)

2006-12-02T02:37:00.000-06:00

Niles North
Board 1: Ilan...............12
Board 2: Ben...............11
Board 3: Mike.............10
Board 4: Igor...............0
Board 5: Oscar............8
Board 6: Ninoshka......3.5
Board 7: Tom..............0
Board 8: Glencoe........0

Final Score: Niles North - 44.5 New Trier - 23.5

Evanston Team Tournament

2006-11-12T22:58:00.000-06:00

The Niles North Chess Team recently played in the annual Evanston Team Tournament. Considering the fact that we were missing three of our higher boards we did very well, placing second among 20 teams from nine conferences. Here was the breakdown of the boards: 1. Ilan Meerovich 2. Ben Rothschild 3. Oscar Miranda 4. Igor Fortel 5. Michael Thariath 6. Thomas Dykes 7. Wolfman (Fedor Titov) 8. Sherwin Varghese. Ilan and Mike both scored all four points and placed first in their sections! Oscar Miranda, filling in for Joseph Liu did extremely well getting 3/4 points and placing third among board threes. In addition, the new players, Tom, Wolfman, and Sherwin did a great job for their first time playing on the A team. Third round we were paired with Lincoln Way Central (a very strong team this year) and came out on top winning 54.5 to 13.5. The last round was the toughest because we were paired with Evanston (last years state runner ups) and unfortunately we were not strong enough on the lower boards. However, this was a great learning experience for the new players and for the lower boards filling in on top. Lastly, a freshman named Glen Ko went 3-1 in the open section tying for fourth place. I am extremely happy with everyone's performance and hope to see everyone do well in upcoming tournaments. Great job team!

Niles North attends Bloom Trail

2006-11-07T20:55:00.000-06:00

Top Left: Ilan Meerovich,3rd Place Finisher.
Right: Members of the Niles North Team receive their plaque(From L to R- fedor titov,Akhil Shah, Ben Rothschild,Ben Shapiro
Bottom Left: Ben Rothschild,2nd place finisher

Niles North recently attended the Knights of the Round Table tournament at Bloom Trail. We won 3rd place out of 28 schools. We did pretty good, considering our boards 3,4, and 6 were not there. In the Individual section, Ben Rothschild and Ilan Meerovich from Niles North recieved perfect scores. Some other undefeateds were Adam Strunk, Loe Kirsch and Jim Tian. Here are some tactics from my games I encounterd:

Black just played the move b5?! with playing Bb7. Is there anyway white can win material?

Sorry about the poor image quality. White has rooks on a1 and d1 and a king on g1. White played here Nxf5. Is this a good move or a bad move?
Feel free to post your answers in the comment box. I will update the commment box with the correct answers in a 3-4 days.
*All pictures provided by www.chesscoach.org

Niles West Meet

2006-11-04T22:05:00.000-06:00

Hey guys!

Yesterday, we played Niles West in the standard eight board format meet. We were missing boards 3,4, and 6 and still managed to come out on top with a score of 68 to 0. Everyone played extremely well and did a great job of filling in for the missing players. Cabbage (aka Justin Braddy) played for first time on board 8. He played tremendously winning in a mere seven moves with the Blackburne Gambit involving a smother mate! Ilan Meerovich, also won with a bishop and knight checkmate in endgame. Good luck to Niles West in the upcoming season and great job team!

Bloom Trail

2006-10-30T23:03:00.000-06:00

Niles North will be attending the Knights of the Round Table( Bloom Trail) tournament this weekend. We are bringing 10-18 players to this tournament, which will be good practice for the freshmen. I'll keep you tuned on how it goes. :)

Annotated Game From Stevenson Tournament

2006-10-30T02:26:00.000-06:00

Well.. it's 2 a.m. on Monday morning and I have two english projects and a physics lab to do, so I decided to annotate my last round game from the Stevenson tournament instead of doing all that... So, I hope you all enjoy it. This was the last round game from the tournament.

(1) Thariath,Michael - Day,Andrew [B07]
Stevenson Tournament, 28.10.2006
1.e4 d6 2.d4 Nf6 3.Nc3 g6 4.Be3 Bg7 5.f3 0-0 6.Qd2 e5 7.d5 Nbd7 8.0-0-0 Ne8??

The position was roughly equal before this blunderous move. Black undevelopes, and allows white to obtain an initiative in the kingside. 9.h4 f5 10.Bh6?! Better was: [10.Bg5!! Bf6 (10...Ndf6 11.h5) 11.Bh6 Bg7 12.h5 This variation would be better for white, since white has managed to push the h-pawn and also maintains the initiative and an attack.] 10...f4 11.Bxg7 Kxg7 12.g4 Ndf6 13.Bh3

The idea of this move was to play g4, then place the bishop on g4, after which trading the bishop for either black's knight or light-squared bishop would be advantageous. 13...a5?! Black cannot attack on the queenside, because all of black's pieces are stuck on the kingside, and white can easily close up the queenside. 14.Nge2 a4 15.g5 Nh5 16.Bg4 a3 17.b3 b6 Black really can't do anything, because white's pawn on d5 severely cramps black, and white has a huge initiative. 18.Bxh5 gxh5 19.Rdg1 Kg6 20.Nd1

The idea of this move was to play Nf2-d3, and then maybe sacrifice a knight on f4, taking advantage of black's awkwardly placed king. 20...Qd7 21.Nf2 Ba6 22.Rh2!? Although white still retains an advantage, better would have been to play 22. c4, after which black cannot trade knights, and white can still sacrifice on f4. The c4-pawn also could have helped prevent black from gaining any counterplay in the queenside. 22...Bxe2 23.Qxe2 Ra5 24.Nd3 Ng7

Black must now try to activate all of his pieces to try and gain some counterplay. 25.Nb4 Rc8?! This move gives white a solid advantage, and a crushing initiative. 26.Nc6! Rc5 27.Qa6!

White is threatening Qxc8, and after black takes the queen, Ne7+ gives white a clear advantage. 27...Rxc6 One of black's only options. Black also could have played Kf7, but after g6, white's open g-file will provide vast amounts of counterplay. 28.dxc6 Qxc6?? Simply drops the rook on c8. 29.Qxc8 Qc3 30.Qh3?? White was in severe time trouble, and simply was fatigued. [30.Rf1!! Kf7 31.Kd1 Qa1+ 32.Ke2 Qxa2 33.Qxc7+ This variation prevents black from getting any perpectual checks, since the f-pawn is protected by the rook, and white is on a light square.] 30...Qa1+ 31.Kd2 Qxg1 And a draw was agreed. 1/2-1/2

Meet 3 (Niles North @ Maine South)

2006-10-29T11:55:00.000-06:00

So far no one has posted anything about our meet against Maine South, so i guess its my job to deliver the news...
On Friday October 27, 2006 Niles North experienced its first loss of the season. The Niles North vs. Maine South meet went to Maine South. The results:
B1 Ilan .............. 0
B2 Ben .............. 5.5
B3 Rasesh ........ 10
B4 Mike T ........ 0
B5 Igor ............. 8
B6 Oscar........... 0
B7 Tom ............ 3
B8 Philip .......... 0

Final Score: Niles North - 26.5
Maine South - 41.5
Congratulations Maine South

This was a pretty big loss for Niles North, but not one without merit. From every experience we go through as a team we learn more about ourselves, regardless of the score. This meet has been an eye opening experience and a devastating loss, but always we endeavor to look on the bright side. Coash K, who was unable to attend this meet, was so stricken with grief that he resolved to change a couple of rules and now declares mandatory attendance to meets (he blames our loss on the absence of boards 3 and 5). Through every struggle our determination grows and we as a team become more prepared to put everyhtign on the line for the 2007 IHSA state championships.

Stevenson Tournament

2006-10-28T22:51:00.000-05:00

We Just Finished Playing The Stevenson Tournament. We Played some Hard Teams. Not having our regular boards 3 and 4, We moved up our boards 5,7 and 8. Our board order was:
1-Ilan
2-Ben
3-Mike
4-Igor
5-Oscar
Our first team match was against Deerfield, where all of our Boards Swept with a Total of 40 points to 0.
Our second match was against Stevenson, which we would have lost were it not for Oscar's draw on board 5.
Our third match was against Evanston - a very breath taking match in which everyone would die of the suspence. Niles North Handled it carefully and won the tournament.
Evanston tied Stevenson for second place.
For the open we brought a few kids and they did fairly well. Thomas Dykes (Niles North) tied for first.
As one of our first tournaments we did well, winning the team tournament and having Tom tied for first in the open. I also want to thank Stevenson for hosting this wonderful tournament.
-Good Job Team-

Meet 2(Niles West vs. Niles North B)

2006-10-26T19:32:00.000-05:00

Our B team just finished their meet against Niles West's A team. Although we lost 38-34 I think it was a really successful meet because it was great learning experience. The scores broke down like this:
Board 1: Igor...........12
Board 2: Oscar........11
Board 3: Tom...........5
Board 4: Phil.............0
Board 5: Wolfman....0
Board 6: Varghese...0
Board 7: Cabbage.....6
Board 8: Glencoe......0
Board 9: Shapiro......0
Im looking forward to many more B and A team meets.
Great job team!

Upcoming Tournaments/Meets

2006-10-23T13:52:00.000-05:00

This Friday we have an away meet versus Main South. Also this saturday Niles North will be probably attending the Stevenson 5-board tournament.

2006 Midwest Class/US Open Games/Analysis

2006-10-21T14:36:00.000-05:00

By Ilan Meerovich..

Meerovich,Ilan (2000) - Mc Nally ,Dan (1940) [A40]
2006 Midwest Class (5), 15.10.2006

1.d4 e6 2.c4 b6 3.Nf3 Bb7 The English Defence 4.g3 Bxf3 5.exf3

5...c6 6.Bg2 I should have played Bd3, Since the Bishop on g2 had no target on the closed diaganol and movedback to f1 later in the game.

[6.Nc3 d5 7.cxd5 exd5 8.Bd3 Be7 9.0-0 Bf6 10.Bc2 a6 11.Qd3 Ne7 12.Re1 Nd7 13.Bf4 Nf8 14.Be5 Bxe5 15.Rxe5 Ne6 16.Rae1 Ra7 17.f4 g6 18.Qd2 Ng7 19.f5 f6 20.R5e3 gxf5 21.Ne2 Qd6 22.Nf4 Kf7 23.h4

Ng6 24.Ne6 Nxe6 25.Rxe6 Qxe6 26.Rxe6 Kxe6 27.Qe3+ Kf7 28.Bxf5 Re7 29.Qh6 Nf8 1-0 andersson-Ljubovejic Amber-Blind Rapid tournament ] 6...d5 7.cxd5 cxd5 8.0-0 Be7 Black's weaknesses are the C file, and c6 square in particular 9.Nc3 Nf6 10.Bf4 a6 [10...Nbd7 11.Nb5 0-0 12.Rc1 White has control of the C file. 12...Rc8 13.Bc7 Qe8 14.Nd6] 11.Qb3 Nbd7 12.Rfc1 Rc8 13.Bf1 Ra8 14.Na4 Ra7 15.Rc2 0-0 16.Rac1 b5 [16...Re8 17.Rc7 Rxc7 18.Rxc7 b5; 16...Rb7 17.Rc8 Qxc8 18.Rxc8 Rxc8 19.Bxa6] 17.Nc3 [17.Nc5 Bxc5 18.dxc5 e5 I did not really like this position for me, Black has a passed pawn too, and the position is unclear.] 17...Nb6 18.a4 b4 19.Na2 Na8

Undevelopment [19...a5 20.Bc7; 19...Nc4 20.Bxc4 dxc4 21.Rxc4 Nd5 22.Be5 f6 23.Bf4 a5 24.Rc6 Was probably better then what happend in the game] 20.Rc6 Nd7 21.Bxa6 g5 22.Bd2 Qa5 [22...Nb8 This was his plan, I think, but It did not work because I have Rc8 Here.] 23.Bb5 Nc7 24.Nxb4

24...Nxb5 25.Nxd5 Qxa4 26.Nxe7+ Kg7 27.Qe3 h6 28.h4 He had about 5 minutes left in this position. 28...Nb8 29.R6c4 Qa6 30.hxg5 Rxe7 31.Bb4 Nd6 32.Qe5+ f6 33.Qxd6 Qxd6 34.Bxd6 Diagram Conclusion:Black should have played 7.. exd5 and try to attack the isolated d4 pawn. After 7..cxd5 white should be positionally better. 1-0

Kurczynski,Ray (1586) - Thariath,Michael (1210) [B76]

US Open (3), 09.08.2006

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 g6 6.Be3 Bg7 7.f3 0-0 8.Qd2 Nc6

9.0-0-0 d5

Thematic move in alot of sicilians. Usually if black is allowed this move He is atleast equal 10.Nxc6 bxc6 11.exd5 cxd5 12.Nxd5 Nxd5 13.Qxd5 Qc7

14.Qc5 [14.Qxa8 Bf5 15.Qxf8+ Kxf8 Is complicated and black needs to know theory.] 14...Qb7 15.Bd4 Bf5 16.Qb5 Qc7 17.Qc5 Qb8 18.Ba6 Qf4+ 19.Kb1 [19.Be3 White seems fine after Be3, 19...Qa4 20.Qc4 Bxc2 21.Qxa4 Bxa4 22.b3 Bc6] 19...Rfc8!

20.Bxc8 Rxc8 21.Qb4 [21.Qxc8+ Bxc8 22.Bxa7 Qc7 23.b4 Qxa7 24.Rd8+ Bf8 25.Rxc8 Qb7 26.Rc4 e6 27.c3 Qa6 28.Rd4 Qe2] 21...Bxc2+ 22.Ka1 Bxd1 0-1

Meet 1(Glenbrook South @ Niles North)

2006-10-21T03:04:00.000-05:00

Board #: GBS NN
Board 1: 6 ...... 6
Board 2: 0 ..... 11
Board 3: 0 ..... 10
Board 4: 0 ..... 9
Board 5: 4 ..... 4
Board 6: 0 ..... 7
Board 7: 0 ..... 6
Board 8: 5 ..... 0

Total: ... 15 .. 53

Great start to the season guys; I'm glad to see most of the team attended the first meet here at home. Great job to those that played today!

Post the First

2006-10-18T20:13:00.000-05:00

Match vs. GBN on friday for A team... thursday vs. niles west for B team. Yea, we have two teams which provides us with hope for the future. So, come check us out or see us in action in our first tournament in two weeks.