03.16.16 Two hundred seventy-five scholastic chess players descended on the University of Maine in Orono from all corners of the state on Saturday, March 12, to compete in the Maine State Scholastic Team Chess Championships. From Van Buren to Cape Elizabeth and many communities in between, players, parents, coaches, and volunteers helped to create this massive event. We bring you the richly illustrated tournament report with crosstables of all nine sections.

USCF crosstable: High School Championship

High School Championship Team standings crosstable

High School Novice crosstable High School Novice Team Abbreviations: BPT Bucksport, CAH Camden Hills, CBA Caribou A, CBB Caribou B, FXC Foxcroft Academy, GSA George Stevens Academy

USCF crosstable: High School Reserve, Junior High School Championship, K-6 Championship, K-3 Championship

Junior High School Novice crosstable Junior High School Novice Team Abbreviations: CTL Central (Corinth), ELL Ellsworth, PSC Piscataquis, RBR Reeds Brook

K-6 Novice Crosstable
K-6 Novice Team Abbreviations: BHL Blue Hill, CPE Cape Elizabeth, DIS Deer Isle-Stonington, ELL Ellsworth, PSC Piscataquis, RBR Reeds Brook

High School Reserve Team standings crosstable

Junior High School Championship Team standings crosstable

K-6 Championship Team standings crosstable

K-3 Championship & Novice Team standings crosstable

Expanded Team Names Index for Championship sections

Attracting 275 players in nine sections we believe this tournament is the largest scholastic chess tournament in New England. A huge event like this does not happen on its own. An incredible amount of volunteer work went into organizing and running the tournament. We would like to extend our sincere appreciation to the Maine Association of Chess Coaches, the Maine Chess Association, and the University of Maine for their support of this great event. In particular, we would like to single out the following individuals for giving their time and energy to run this tournament: Andy Bryan, Dan DeLuca, Phil Lowell, Isaac Marnik, Kathy Richards, Tom Sandford and Steve Wong. Thank you as well to all the players participating, and to parents, coaches and chaperones.

The battle for the high school championship state title was a tense and dramatic one. Hoping to repeat as state champions, Cheverus High School with 2.5 match points was paired with Cape Elizabeth High School who had 3.0 points going into the final round. Cape needed just a draw in this final matchup (2.5 game points or better) to wrest the title from Cheverus. For some time it looked as if this was going to be impossible as the lower three boards for Cheverus all has very strong positions. Boards one and two went for Cape Elizabeth with Matthew Fishbein and Wesley Parker notching wins while boards three and five saw wins for Ceverus on the strong performances of Aiden Thomas and Brian Conti. On board four a titanic struggle was raging between Cheverus's Aiden Thomas and Cape's Joey DeMarco. Thomas seemed to have the better of it late into the middlegame when DeMarco essayed an exchange sacrifice in order to queen his a-pawn. After a series of checks and exchanges, DeMarco captured Thomas's rook to leave king and knight for white and king and pawn for black. Suddenly DeMarco's flag fell and white claimed a win on time. However, the tournament director correctly declared the game drawn citing USCF Rule 14E2: The game is drawn even when a player exceeds the time limit if one of the following conditions exists: Opponent has only king and bishop or king and knight and does not have a forced win. Therefore the game was drawn and Cape Elizabeth captured the title by the slimmest possible margin. Orono High School and Cheverus High School tied for second place with 3.0 match points and Orono took home the second place trophy on tie breaks.

In the High School Reserve section, the mighty team from Van Buren scored 8.0 points to take the top spot. The team included Kaleb Cormier (3.0), Thomas LaJoie (3.0), Skyler Paridis (2.0), Kaila Roy (1.5) and Brenton Soucy (1.0). Team scores in the Reserve section are calculated using the top three scorers on each team. Following closely behind Van Buren was Medomak Valley High School with 7.0 points and Monmouth Academy with 6.0 points.

Caribou High School's A Team took first in the non-rated High School Reserve section scoring 10.5 points. They held a commanding lead over second place finishers Bucksport High School who score 5.5 points.

With strong performances from Bill Hartt (4.0), Daniel Brower (3.5), Liana Shaw (3.5), Josh Lovejoy (3.0) and Ian Kelly (3.0) Caravel Middle School took first place in the Junior High School Championship section. Last year's champions, Blue Hill Consolidated School, scored 13.5 points to take clear second place. Holbrook Middle School and the Airline Community School tied for third with 12.0 points apiece. Also of note in this section was the one-person team of Oliver Brown Patricio who scored a perfect 4.0 points in four games.

Piscataquis Community School finished first in the Junior High School Novice section with 11.0 points out of a possible 12.0. In second place was Reeds Brook School with 9.5 points.

Deer Isle-Stonington padded their coffers with another state championship title in the K-6 section. They scored 12.5 points edging out second place All Saints Catholic School who put up 11.0 points. In third was Brewer Community School with 8.5 points.

Cape Elizabeth's Pond Cove Elementary School took first in the K-6 Novice section with 10.5 points. Blue Hill Consolidated School finished second with 9.0 points.

Brewer Community School dominated the K-3 Championship section scoring 9.0 points out of a possible 12.0. Ellsworth Took first in the Novice section on a very respectable performance of 5.0 points. Tied for second in the Championship section with 4.0 points were Lamoine on the army-of-one performance of Sofia Brown Patricio (the only player to go unbeaten and untied in this section), and Abe Lincoln Elementary School. Deer Isle-Stonington and Piscataquis finished fourth and fifth respectively. All Saints Catholic School took second in the Novice section and Great Falls third.

The deciding match between Cheverus High School (left) and Cape Elizabeth High School

Cape Elizabeth's top gun: Matthew Fishbein

Board 2: Wesley Parker

Board 3: Carter Brock

Board 4: Joey DeMarco

Board 5: Roman Medina

Cheverus's Board 1: Ricardo Romero

Board 2: Nathan Dunn

Board 3: Aiden Thomas

Board 4 Robert Bossong

Board 5: Brian Conti

Bangor High School (left) vs Medomak Valley High School

Caribou High School (left) vs Co-Runner Up Orono High School

Deer Isle-Stonington High School (left) vs Westbrook High School

Brewer High School (left) vs Maine School of Science and Mathematics

George Stevens Academy (left) vs John Bapst Memorial High School

High School Championship section tournament director Phil Lowell

The last round pairings generated lots of interest.

The High School Championship section tournament room just before...

...and during the final round.

2016 High School Champions: Cape Elizabeth

2016 High School Co-Runner Up (with Cheverus High School): Orono High School

Now on to the High School Reserve section

Kaleb Cormier, Van Buren

SooZin Cha, Deer Isle-Stonington

Thomas LaJoie, Van Buren

Nehemiah Brown on a team of one he dubbed The Fool's Mate

Emmanuel Tung, MSSM

Jacob McPhee, Medomak

Adam Buhlen, Bucksport

Michael Manetti, Cheverus

Andrew Reny, Monmouth

Matthew Yim, Cape Elizabeth

Patrick Madden, Medomak

Skyler Paradis, Van Buren

Kaila Roy, Van Buren

Oliver Brown, Medomak

Josh Powers, Cape Elizabeth

Dennis Kallor, Cheverus

Jason Kulinski, Monmouth

Rohan Freedman, Cape Elizabeth

Diana Bryant, John Bapst

Robert Pettergill, Monmouth

Cody Crummett, Medomak

Alex Austin, Cheverus

High School Reserve Champions: Van Buren High School

High School Reserve Runner Up: Medomak Valley High School

High School Novice Champions: Caribou High School

High School Novice Runner Up: Bucksport High School

The High School Novice section

Bill Hartt lead his team from Caravel Middle School to the state Junior High School Championship with a perfect 4.0 points.

The only other perfect score in the Junior High Section was turned in by Oliver Brown Patricio from Lamoine.

Cyrus Grindal from the Airline Community School

Brent Roberts from Brewer Community School

Blue Hill Consolidated School's Cole Stewart

Daniel Brower from Caravel

Sam Parrott playing for Blue Hill Consolidated School

Ben Mock representing Holbrook School

Liam Farrell playing for Orono Middle School

Cody Jones of the Airline School

Liana Shaw under the colors of Caravel Middle School

Ben Penfold proudly representing Deer Isle-Stonington

Cam Stewart playing for Blue Hill Consolidated School

Jake Parker playing in his first USCF-rated tournament for Holbrook School

Sam Slavin of Orono Middle School

Duncan Howell sports his Blue Hill Consolidated t-shirt.

Brady Smith, Airline Community School

Atticus Foster, Orono Middle School

Henry Clarke, also from Orono Middle School

Ian Kelly playing for Caravel Middle School

Jesse Ginn representing Bucksport Middle School

Josh Watson of Glenburn

Colby Allen playing for Medomak

Ian Howell doing his best for Blue Hill Consolidated School

Josh Lovejoy of Caravel Middle School

Liam Webb, Blue Hill Consolidated School

Tournament director Isaac Marnik surveys the Junior High School Championship section.

When it was said and done in the Junior High School section, Caravel Middle School came out on top with a score of 17.0 points.

Junior High School Runner Up Blue Hill Consolidated School

Parents and coaches vie for a shot of the championship teams.

First in the Junior High School Novice section: Piscataquis Community School

Second in the Junior High School Novice section: Reeds Brook Secondary School

Novice sections tournament director Tom Sandford did Yeoman's work! Thanks Tom!

On to the K-6 Championship section

Liam Hillery of All Saints Catholic School plays round three on Board 1 vs...

Deer Isle-Stonington's Henry Penfold.

Brewer Community School's Swaroop Handral

Anthony Mitchell of All Saints Catholic School

Samuel Brissette-Hatch, All Saints Catholic School

Parker Black of Glenburn was the only player in the Junior High School Championship section to score a perfect 4.0 points in four games.

William Xu represented the Mary Snow School

Owen Staples of Deer Isle-Stonington

Lucas Modrusan of All Saints Catholic School

Cole Mannisto plays for Airline Community School

Omair Khan, Brewer Community School

Maya Brown represents Deer Isle-Stonington Elementary School

Brayden Martin, Deer Isle-Stonington

Evan Astbury, Brewer Community School

Brigit Frazier, All Saints Catholic School

Colin Grover play in his first USCF-rated tournament for Brewer Community School

Chloe Douglas also of Brewer Community School

Jeremy Marks, Orono Middle School

Dawson Hunter, Brewer Community School

Ruby DeLuca Lowell, Airline Community School

Gabe Schmick, Holbrook

Dominic Tower, Brewer Community School

In the end it was Deer Isle-Stonington in first with 12.5 points

K-6 Championship section Runner Up: All Saints Catholic School

Brewer Community School took third

Peter Black was unrated but that did not sop him from putting up an unbeaten and untied perfect score of 4.0 points for Glenburn.

Thanks to K-6 tournament director Steve Wong

In the midst of it all we celebrated the 10th year anniversary of ChessMaine.net with a gigantic cake.

Maine Chess Association president Andy Bryan did the honors.

I would say he enjoyed his piece of cake.

First in the K-6 Novice section: Pond Cove Elementary School, Cape Elizabeth

Runner Up in the K-6 Novice section: Blue Hill Consolidated School

The only player in the K-3 Championship section to score a perfect 4.0 points in as many games: Sofia Brown Patricio of Lamoine

Christopher Taylor, Ellsworth Elementary School

Jacob Klein, Abe Lincoln School

Brody Hubbard, Brewer Community School

Griffith Young, Ellsworth Elementary School

Dele Jammeh, Brewer Community School

Elenor Morgan, Great Falls

Violet Damon, Brewer Community School

Lily Eubanks, Brewer Community School

Avital Vaughn, Deer Isle-Stonington Elementary School

Reice Jamison, Brewer Community School

Sam Robbins, Deer Isle-Stonington Elementary School

Marcus Legere, Deer Isle-Stonington Elementary School

Caeden Earl, Abe Lincoln Elementary School

Karrigan Wilson, Piscataquis Community School


Isaiah Hatch, Deer Isle-Stonington Elementary School

K-3 tournament director Andy Bryan keeps a watchful eye on the games in his section.

The K-3 tournament room

First in the K-3 Championship section: Brewer Community School

Runners Up in the K-3 Championship section: Abe Lincoln Elementary School, Jacob Klein (left), Caeden Earl (center) and Lamoine Elementary School, represented by Sofia Brown Patricio (right).

First in the K-3 Reserve section: Ellsworth Elementary School

Second place in the K-3 Novice section, an army of one: Karrigan Wilson

The entire K-3 contingent

Thanks again for all who participated and helped make this event a great, positive learning experience for the students.
We hope to see you at the State Scholastic Individual Championships on Saturday, March 26. Please see the ChessMaine.net events page for more information.