Scorpions score slip by St. Louis in a tense come-from-behind battle! Last week Arizona made yet another appearance into the US Chess League Playoffs as they were paired against the St. Louis Arch Bishops. St. Louis held the tie-break advantage, if the match was tied 2-2, Arizona would be sent packing and preparing for the next season. It seemed that the Arizona game play for the night was for Mac Molner to draw his game (even though Mac was was not feeling well) and to win on Board 4, to basically repeat the results from two weeks ago when these same two teams, and same four players last met. It worked out then, why wouldn't it work out now? Well, Mac did draw his game, but Dipro did not get his expected result. After two games AZ only had 1/2 point. This meant that to advance to the Semi Finals Arizona would have to defeat this years top stars in the USCL, Kannappan and Bregadze, this seemed like an insurmountable feat, yet the veteran players for Arizona have seen it all before and put up some really solid play to score two points on the middle two boards, this victory gives Arizona the chance to face Seattle - haha, I always want to type in "Dallas" there, don't you? Enjoy the video, there are some exciting games to look at.
Arizona Wraps 2012 Regular Season With Another Win
Last week the Scorpions took on the Carolina Cobras and zapped the last remaining bit of strength and beat them 2.5-1.5. While this was not a 'must win' match for Arizona is was a nice warm up for the upcoming post season play.
This week I mostly focused on two games from the Cobra-Scorpion event, the game between Craig Jones vs Mark Ginsburg and the game between Jonathan Schroer vs Mac Molner.
First of all, the Ginsburg vs Jones game. It's always fun to watch a friend play another friend. Of the two I believe Mark has the superior fighting spirit, Craig has a seemingly ever lasting joy for the wonders of the game of chess. Mark seems to be a technician in his approach while Craig has moments of great artistic flair. This game looked to be an exciting oneeven though this match meant little in the standings. It started out with Mark getting the upper hand and gaining what I felt was, if not a winning position, it was certainly close to winning. Credit Craig for hanging in there, he managed to hold Mark to a draw in the end.
The other game that interested me was Mackenzie Molner's game. Since I just classified the previous two players I gave some thought as to the classification that Mac might fall under; Romantic comes to mind, but that's not quite right. Tactician? Defensive mastery? No, though he did make one defensive move in this game. How does one classify the play of Mackenzie Molner.
Calling Mac a Romantic is really only true on the surface because of the openings he plays. But he plays these Romantic openings in the era of chess computers and in-depth opening analysis and preparation. Often his play is risky. He seems to be flying by the seat of his pants sometimes. It's really difficult to pin Mac to a chess style, you almost need to reach outside the realm of chess to understand his mindset to the game, he's a real Maverick of sorts.
In the following video I try my best to pinpoint Mac's aggressive playing style, to try and find out why he plays the way he plays. When I pieced it all together with another career it all started to make sense to me.
Watching Mac's game is not easy on team mates and his fans. In this game he sac's the exchange and a pawn as early as move 10 when he has not even castled. Theory, maybe, yes. But theory, while important, can be bent and swayed by the likes of Mackenzie Molner. Now, the good news for Mac's team mates and fans is that, though they may be scared, Mac's opponents are scared too!
Enjoy the video. If you'd like to skip straight to the start of the game, jump to time mark 11:54.
Once again the Arizona Scorpions find their way into the US Chess League Playoffs.
Arizona has had a pretty good year, though there were some bumps in the road along the way.
Last week the Scorpions took on the St. Louis Arch Bishops in a match that had chances for Arizona to really put the screws to their opposition, but there were missed chances for both sides, so it seems fitting that the decisive result came down to the players on Board 4, Chakraborty vs Hendrickson.
Board 1 was a tight positional affair that was fairly level throughout much of the game, but towards the end Mac Molner took a risky shot to gain some play. Panic on his opponent's part allowed Mac to hold the draw. But as the video will clearly show, St. Louis missed a golden opportunity in this game.
The favor was returned in the Altounian vs Kannappan game. Lev built up a nice position and seemed to be clearly winning, yet he missed the critical move Rc7 (after d6), I feel that Kannappan would have resigned a few moves later had he played this move. As the game progressed Lev won a piece but his opponent traded down to a R&N vs R endgame and was able to hold the draw!
Mohandesi managed to draw his game will a typical Mohandesi positional grind.
So far there were three draws but on Board 4 things looked better for Arizona, and indeed, Dipro kept his calm. In a comfortable endgame where he was a pawn up he only needed to find a way to trade queens when his opponent gave him a gift and hung his knight. This made the win super easy and with this win Arizona was able to sail into the playoffs.
Next the Scorpions take on the Carolina Cobras. This match is important to Arizona as a victory here may improve Arizona's current 4th position in the post season play.
Here is a video of game fragments from the Scorpions vs Arch Bishops - enjoy!
News Flash! Mechanics get stung by swarm of Scorpions!
The past two weeks have been rather bizarre ones for the Arizona Scorpions. In Week 4 the Scorpions were pitted against the Manhattan Applesauce in a match-up that I was sure Arizona should tie or win. Indeed it looked like it was going to be a tied match when Manhattan had the upper hand after three complete games.
Arizona needed to win on board 4 where a newcomer to the chess league was playing, Dipro Chakraborty. Dipro worked his way out of a difficult opening eventually gaining the upper hand. With 1 minute 27 seconds on his clock he needed to find one of many 'safe' moves to keep the win alive (Nc5 being the most obvious move). Yet, for some unknown reason, Dipro forfeited on time! This loss handed the Applesauce the match win. The Applesauce, really? It's embarrassing to lose to a team with that kind of tame name. It's like Green Bay losing to the Tallahassee Butterflies!
After this sour turn of events the Arizona players showed up for Week 5 looking for redemption of some sort. And a redemption is what they got... IN SPADES!
Board 1 was an interesting battle between Mac Molner against Jessie Kraai. Mac, not understanding endgame concepts all too well went in for an endgame two pawns down. Not the first time we have seen this. Mac, if you're reading this, you want to be UP in material for the endgame, not down in material. Seriously though, Mac had compensation, and this is exactly what you want to do in a Team situation and with the leagues quick time controls. In the end it seemed to confuse Jessie as much as it did Mac and the game petered out to a draw. BUT, at one move before the players agreed to a draw, Mac missed a chance to win the game after a blunder by Jessie. Both players missed it, and rather than play on and commit more mistakes, they called it a draw.
On board 2 We had Lev Altounian back in the mix for Arizona. He took on Dmitry Zilberstein. I was not able to watch these games live as my father passed away earlier that day, but it seems the players must have both gotten into time pressure, well, at least Dmitry must have. Lev threw out the Dutch defense and after a slight inaccuracy in the opening by Dmitry Lev was able to gain the upper hand. Lev found a unique geometrical formula to gain the win of a pawn in a most unique manner. Eventually Lev was able to create connected passed pawns on the queenside but the play was still complex. After a few very small inaccuracies by Lev the door was open for Dmitry to hold the game, but here's where the time pressure seems to have crept in. Dmitry did not play the R&B ending well at all and this allowed Lev to advance both pawns to the 2nd rank, both ready to promote, this was too much for Dmitry who decided to resign at that point.
Board 3 had Mark Ginsburg in good form in his game against the younger Yian Liou. In a rather innocent looking position Yian made a seemingly obvious move (...Nf5 when ...f5 needed to be played) and after this his game slid downhill rapidly. He still made things tough for Mark, and to be honest, Mark missed a couple of shots to make things easier on himself. As things looked like Yian was going to find a way to hold the game Mark came up with an ingenious idea of giving up a piece, in the endgame (yes, they ALL seem to play this way) but he was able to trap his opponent's bishop on a relatively open board. This also allowed Mark to infiltrate his rook with great effect and this eventually would prove enough to force through the win. While this was not one of the best played games I've seen, the concept that Mark came up with was one of the most entertaining ideas I've ever seen on a chessboard.
One board 4 we have Amanda Mateer goint against Kesav Viswanadha. Amanda played the Sicilian in answer to 1.e4, but her opponent quickly wimped out by playing the c3 line against her. Play was tricky in some parts, Kesav offered the c3 pawn as bait and with a Materialistic Girl like Amanda the fear was she would take it. No! Of course she wouldn't, she kept a nice solid position and improved her pieces. It was a bit funny that she never castled but ended up bringing her KR to d5 via h5 in the early part of the middlegame. Later in the game Amanda had a very nice position but made an outright blunder with ...Kd7, fortunately her opponent missed the winning line and for some reason went full tilt, giving up a rook for some unknown reason. The remainder of the game was really target practice for Amanda, though, I must confess that she missed a few quick mating patterns. Still, when you're cleaning someone's clock, you don't need to look hard for mates. It was a nice game in my opinion and for Kesav to spot Amanda's mistake he needed to see a somewhat backwards move that younger players are prone to miss.
You can watch all the highlights here in this video:
Arizona has had a nice start to the 2012 season, that is until they were paired against the Seattle Sluggers that is!
Coming off last week's match against the Inventors the Scorpions had some reason to feel suspicious about their play, still they pressed forward with the same line-up as last week, but this time things turned out differently. Pedram Atoufi, playing Board 4 for Arizona pushed hard to win his game, but it was just not there to be had.
On Board 3 Robby Adamson faced Joshua Sinanan and the two got into a tough fray in a Dutch Defense that Robby threw at him. In a moment of inspiration Joshua found the very interesting move of 25.Rxe4! Now, this move was pretty much a must move for him as all other moves looked like passive defense, and I know that's not what Joshua (or any "real" chessplayer) would want to play. By giving up the exchange Josh was able to liven up the game, after a few slightly inaccurate moves Robby soon found himself in trouble. Eventually Robby had to resigned in a position where he was a piece down.
On Board 2 Mark Ginsburg dodged a big bullet in his game against Giorgi Orlov. Mark played an interesting move in the King's Indian Defense Saemish variation, namely 9.Bd3. Orlov gave up the exchange to get some fast moving pawns and, to be frank, I think that Black was probably winning by move 50, however, inaccurate moves creep in to games at faster time controls and this game was no different. Through tenacious defense, and a timely return of material, Mark was able to achieve a theoretically drawn endgame a pawn down, but he still had to prove it, and prove it he did - good job Mark!
On the top board we had the match-up of Akobian vs Mac Molner. This was a tense affair as Mac whipped out the Blumenfeld. Mac played an interesting Novelty with 9. ...Qg6. There seem to be conflicting views on this move (6. ...Qb6 being the norm), but I feel Mac's move is legitimate and sensible. That being said, Mac seemed to pick a few 'second best moves' and after enough of those he found himself in a difficult position. For most of the game Akobian seemed to be able to play for two results (a win or a draw) whereas Mac had to find very exacting moves to have chances to hold the game.
Results: Arizona 1 - Seattle 3. Hats off to the Sluggers, they put out a tough field last Monday!
The following video has three game fragments and full coverage of the Akobian vs Molner game.
This week's match-up pits the Arizona Scorpions against the Philadelphia Inventors. This is the first ever meeting between these two teams and it turned out to be an exciting contest.
The video is rather long, but it includes all four games in one video. The games are presented pretty much as play unfolded so the viewer can get a feel for the dynamics involved in Team-Play.
The result of the match was not determined until the closing minutes of the match.
The 2012 US Chess League has just started and the Scorpions at striking down victims already!
September 5th 2012 The Arizona Scorpions took on the LA Vibe and in a tense match-up the Scorpions came out on top. This win was aided by the fact that two of LA's top players are currently in Istanbul for the Olympiad and a back-up player was feeling sick (the Scorpions will do that to a person).
Here you will find my video coverage of the first week match!
In Game one we have Nicky Korba, a new comer to the league taking on, wait for it, a seasoned veteran in Amanda Mateer. Yes, I say seasoned as Amanda has been a solid team member for the Scorpions for several years now. LA would be happy with Nicky getting a draw on board 4, but this was not bad for Arizona either!
I make some comments about the opening night jitters on ICC and chess.com, but the overall coverage on chess.com was great. If you'd like to skip the intro about me and my critique about the opening night stumbles you can move to time mark 13:42 to get right to the game.
In our next video we look at how Lev Altounian fits the role of a true 'Team Player'. He gets an edge and holds it long enough to see what is happening on the other boards before letting his opponent off the hooks with a draw from a slightly superior position in his game against Zhanibek Amanov.
Game 3 is an exciting affair from board 3. Mark Ginsburg, a cagey veteran player, takes on the young and talented Konstantin Kavutskiy. Konstantin played as solidly as possible but Mark got the upper-hand nevertheless. When Konstantin realized things were going south on other boards he seems to press too hard and Mark's year's of experience show through with a fine win.
Finally, the man everybody in Arizona wants to see... Mackenzie Molner takes on Andranik Matikozyan. This is a tense struggle in a Sicilian Najdorf Fischer-Sozin. Andranik makes a decision to push with e5 to complicate the position but Mac is on top of things and offers his rook, if White is willing to take it! Not to be outdone Andranik offers a trade of his queen for 3 minor pieces. Surely this would be enough, right? Well, if those pieces have nothing active to do, well, watch the video and find out!
Next week the Scorpions, for the first time in their league history, take on the Philadelphia Inventors. Most bloggers are expecting this to be a cake-walk for the Inventors, but I'm not so sure. Check in next week for video coverage of that match, or, subscribe for updates.
Sorry if this format is not perfect, this is my first blog and I hope to work out the bugs if given time :-)
