UTB misses Final Four

The Pan American event qualified teams for the President’s Cup, known as the Final Four of College Chess, which will be held April 6-7 in the Washington D.C. suburb of Herndon, Va.

“We were disappointed not to have qualified for the Final Four, but we’re proud of our students to have finished as one of the top five schools in collegiate chess for the sixth straight year. That’s something pretty special,” said Russell Harwood, UTB-TSC chess program director.

In the tournament’s final round on Sunday, the UTB-TSC A Team defeated the UT Dallas B team 3.5 points to .5 points. Mauricio Flores, Max Cornejo and Katerina Nemcova won their games. Axel Bachmann drew his game. The A team finished the tournament with 4 match points out of a possible 6.

Harwood said the A team showed character to bounce back from an upset loss to the University of Illi-nois A team in Saturday’s fifth round.

The UT Dallas A team finished first in the tournament, followed by the Webster University B team, the University of Maryland Baltimore County, the Webster B team, the University of Illinois and the UTB-TSC A team.

The UTB-TSC team has seen fast success in the chess arena after it started competing in 2001. The team won the National K-12/Collegiate Championships in 2005. The University was named Chess College of the Year by the U.S. Chess Federation in 2007. At the 2010 Pan Ams in Milwaukee, the team tied for second place, positioning it for the Final Four in April 2011, where UTB finished third, just one point away from first place. The Chess Team also holds the honor of being the 2011-12 Texas State College Chess Champions.