Pawns Narrowly Escape Crosstown Rivals

The inaugural Club Match for the Sacramento Pawns went all the way down to the wire. The Sacramento Bishops of Honor could even smell the upset. Alas, the Pawns held on to win by the narrowest of margins: 7.5 to 6.5.

The match began with only seven boards, one less than originally planned (sorry Tijuanaboomboom). The Bishops of Honor were left without the services of one of their strongest players. Now playing with a rating advantage on every board, the Pawns cruised to a 4.5 to 2.5 advantage during the first half of the match.

To their credit, the Bishops of Honor clawed back with critical wins by savage919 (Chris) and vish1080 (Vishva). On the cusp of victory, the Pawns could not close the deal. Suddenly the match was knotted at 6.5! In the final game, the Pawns captain blundered away an overwhelming advantage, but pulled out the necessary result in his opponent's time pressure.

Sacramento Bishops of Honor vs Sacramento Pawns

(click here for links to the games)

Board 1: billyjack23 vs NM fpawn 0-2
Board 2: EM-TheChessShark vs kleong12 1-1
Board 3: FlyingFish-2K vs J3Chess24 0-2
Board 4: vish1080 vs MattDanger 1.5-0.5
Board 5: Just_Win_Baby vs chessboi2010 1-1
Board 6: savage919 vs knvsback 2-0
Board 7: bear-bear2000 vs mccumiskey 1-1

Final Score 6.5 - 7.5

Thanks to all of the participants for a fun and competitive evening of chess! Kudos to EM-TheChessShark (Enoch) for organizing the Bishops of Honor team.

J3Chess24 (Javier) dominated the first game before struggling to victory in the second. Check out his first game below.

NM fpawn (Michael) was the rating favorite on top board and won the first game without much trouble. He had the second one under control too. The reader may judge for himself what happened then.