Provincial Interschool Team Championship

This year's B.C. Interschool Team Championship was held in two stages. On February 2, 2002, an elementary school event was held at York House School. Three weeks later, the elementary school finals were held at St. George's School, together with the secondary school championship.

No appreciation of gratitude to the sponsoring schools can do them justice. As every chess organizer knows, any successful event begins with a good idea and a quality facility. The latter is arguably more important.

For the second year in a row, York House generously donated its gymnasium and cafeteria for the event, which attracted twenty teams and over one hundred players, despite a labour dispute which caused many sponsoring teachers and their student teams to be absent. Last year's winner, Our Lady of Perpetual Help, entered two teams and finished in first and second place, despite an upset win by Westcot's top player, Athena Lam, over Our Lady powerhouse Peter Sum. York House's two teams finished a bit lower than predicted, coming in fourth and sixth.

Originally it had been intended to qualify 16 teams to the finals from the York House tournament, but with only 20 teams in the event because of the teacher's dispute, the St. George's elementary tournament was opened to all interested schools.

The finals were played in McLean Hall, at the St. George's senior school, a magnificent room perfectly suited to a chess event. Sixteen elementary schools turned out for the finals, and nine secondary schools.

In the elementary finals, Our Lady of Perpetual Help's first team steamrollered into first place with 18 points out of 20, thereby retaining the championship trophy for another year. The depth of their team was demonstrated when Peter Sum had to leave after two rounds, boosting Bryan and Alisa Young onto boards one and two. The results speak for themselves.

York House redeemed itself by finishing second, edging Vancouver Christian's first team by half a point.

Complications arose with respect to some of the board prizes. Between them, Peter Sum and Bryan Young of Our Lady won every game on board one, Peter winning twice and Bryan winning three times. Bryan's other wins were on board two. And Alisa Young, Bryan's sister, who has been improving at a rapid pace in recent months, won all her games on boards two and three.

In the end, it turned out as listed below. Lesley Cheng, having let slip two winning positions against the resourceful Peter Sum at both York House and St. George's (not to mention saving a horrible position against Athena Lam in the final round at St. George's), took home one of the first board medals. The other went to Andreas Straathof of West Point Grey.

1) Lesley Cheng (York House 1), Andreas Straathof (West Point Grey)

2) Bryan Young (OLPH 1), Lee James Hsu (St. George's 1)

3) Alisa Young (OLPH 1), Razvan Cuculea (RCC 2)

4) Matthew Wong (Vancouver Christian 1), Angelo Graffos (OLPH 1)

In the secondary championship, things were closer. After a drawn match against eventual third place finisher Walnut Grove 2, Winston Churchill moved into contention and crushed eventual second place finisher Princess Margaret 3.5 - 0.5 in the fourth round. Churchill didn't look back, sweeping its final match to finish in first place with 15.5 out of 20.

Board prizes in the secondary event were awarded as follows:

1) Jason Lee (Seaquam), Nikhil Jain (Walnut Grove 2)

2) Glen Nogayev (Winston Churchill), Ivan Zyrianov (John Oliver)

3) Andrew Cheng (Lord Byng), Sugumar Prabhakaran (Princess Margaret)

4) Jonathan Bau (Winston Churchill), Graeme Ross (Lord Byng)