Frank Love Kindergarteners Lead the Way at Shelton View Tournament

March 31st was an amazing day for the Frank Love Chess Club Team.  24 students represented Frank Love at the Shelton View Tournament.  Previously the most students we had at any given tournament was 13.  It is great to see so many kids representing our school.

Going into the last round 10 of our students needed to win (or in one case tie) their last game in order to qualify for the state tournament.  I think the parents were more nervous than the players.  The players walked out of the tournament room one by one with mostly smiles.  7 out of those 10 won their last match.  7 new players from Frank Love have now qualified for the state tournament on April 21st.  That makes 19 students total who have qualified.  Congratulations to Alexander J., Cooper, Henry, JazMinh, Lakshey, Liam R., and Zach!  It was especially heartwarming to see our second grader walk out of his game singing "Walked him down the board," putting to song a chess strategy that Mr. Adams had reviewed at one of the meetings. 

In addition to our new state qualifiers, a few kids who had previously qualified for state, did it again.  Aidan L., and Dylan D., won 4 games out of 5! Kenney and Tyler both had 3.5 points! Cameron had 3 points. Congratulations to all of them!

Liam R., also won the good sportsmanship award at the tournament and went home with 2 trophies.  This is a very prestigious award as it is only given to one or two players at any given tournament.  It makes the whole school proud to have him on our team.  Congratulations Liam!

Some of you may remember that Frank Love has won first place in the kindergarten section at this same tournament in previous years.  This year we topped that.  We had 2 kindergarteners competing.  Alexander V. won first place with 4.5 out of 5 points.  Hayden won second place in the kindergarten section with 4 points!  Congratulations to both of them!  Alexander V was the highest scorer on our team.  Frank Love Kindergarteners led the team in points and swept the kindergarten section.  Amazing! 

We had 9 players at this tournament who competed in their first ever tournament.  Congratulations to Alex K., Andres, Cooper, Drew, Ethan D., JazMinh, Josh, Kai, Lorenzo, and Rileigh.  It is wonderful to see our team growing so much!

All of our players' hard work and tough games came to a grand finale.  Frank Love won the second place team trohpy!

If your student has not qualified for the state tournament and would like to try again, there are some "last chance" state qualifiers on Saturday April 7th.  At least 2 of our players have signed up for the Seattle Last Chance State Qualifier.  You can register online at www.chess4life.com or contact Mr. Adams with any questions.

If your student has qualified for the state tournament you can register at http://www.chesschampions.org/2012.php and contact Mr. Adams or Long Duong for hotel information.

Chess club will be ending for the year after the state tournament.  Our final chess club meeting will be Thursday April 26th.  That's the Thursday after spring break.  Mark your calendars!