Howard University Chess Club's Experience at the Pan-American Intercollegiate Championship

Hello Chess Community!

This is Lawrence D. Custis, President of the Howard University Chess Club, and I'm here to provide a recap on Howard University's Experience at the 2025 Pan-American Intercollegiate Championship (Pan-Ams) held in Charlotte, NC. 
------------------------------------------------
Preparation 📖

As the academic season was coming to a conclusion, everyone knew what season was to begin: Pan-Ams season! So, from chess books to chessable courses, players began preparing heavily for what was to come. Howard University makes it our mission to attend Pan-Ams every year, often throwing our entire semester's budget into making it happen. It's because of how valuable it is to gain experience in a playing field of high-level players. As Grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura has mentioned before: "Chess is Experience". If we want to grow, this experience is pivital! But, in order to gain that experience, we soon figured out we would need to overcome some issues. 

1) Lack of Experienced Players

With many of our advanced seniors graduating such as Goodness Atanda, Malcolm Wooten, and Miles Mattterson, it made our prospects of winning questionable. Actually, we found it difficult to even come up with 10 competitive players due to lack of participation in the qualifiers we held. 


After scouring the club for some time to fill in the last positions, we were able to find 10 people who were committed to participating and had the drive necessary to win! The 10 players are as follows: 

But even with the players now secured, there was one more hurdle to overcome.

2) Finances

The Howard University Chess Club Finance Chairs put our heads together to raise funds for the competition. We sent two proposals to Howard University's Student Activity Fees and Commissions, one for Flights & Coaching and one for Hotels & Entry Fees. Of the two, our biggest problem was solved with the flight funding proposal coming back granted. But, with our hotel funding and entry costs being denied this left us in an interesting situation. The hotel fee would be around $1,000 and the entry cost would be around $500. With the $1,500 goal in mind, Martin Jahill Warren and Katelyn Magoiga got to work immediately. A GoFundMe account was set up, and the two worked tirelessly to reach out to Alumni, Alumni Facebook Groups, Prominent Chess Groups in the Washington DC Area, and to anyone and everyone they could find they promoted the fundraising efforts for HU going to Pan-Ams. And....... it was a success! 


Through the GoFundMe, we were able to raise 66.6% of our goal.

Big Thank You's to:

• 1) Marc Rotenberg ($500) [Perhaps an alias? But Thank you nonetheless]
• 2) Anonymous ($150)
• 3) Kwame Fulani ($100)
• 4) Malcolm Wooten ($100) [Preciate you man, thanks Malcolm]
• 5) Gina DeVarona ($50) [Thank you Ms.Gina! Personally, from Lawrence]
• 6) Anonymous ($50)
• 7) Carl Romer ($25)
• 8) Kristen Pelekanakis ($25)
  
  You might ask, what about the other 33.3%? Actually, previous Pan-Ams attendee and HU Alumni Sagid Mohamed donated the rest of the $500 on his own for us to compete! With this, Howard University had everything needed to go and win. 
  
  Round 1 ♟♟♟
  
  After flying into NC and getting situated into our hotel rooms, Round 1 was to begin in 3 hours. Players began looking into what openings they wanted to play, sharpening up on endgame techniques, and finally it was time. Through this tournament we will keep an eye on Malik-Castro Devarona, our top scoring player, and Team A's results who won a division award, for sake of time.

Our opponents were no easy competition in round 1, putting us up against the 2nd highest-rated team in the entire U1800 section. Nonetheless, HU brought our best. We started by subbing in our alternate, due to the aggressive nature of his play to guarantee a win.

Round 2 ♟♟♟

Round 2 followed the next day, with our match revealed to be against University of Chicago's D Team. Alternate subbed in.

With an amazing Rook Sacrifice and threat of a pawn promotion in the Alekhine, Malik Castro-Devarona goes on to get his 2nd win. Following suit, Lawrence D. Custis completely immobilized his opponent's position in a Reti, and delivered a very satisfying checkmate in the end. And as such, Howard University maintains another draw. Score: [2-2].

Round 3 ♟♟♟

Round 3 beginning a few hours later, was a complete massacre. Howard University completely wipes the floor with our competition. Congrats on the win for all players. For fun's sake, let's look at a game by the Board 4 Xavier Ntamere.

Score: [4-0]

Round 4 ♟♟♟

With the recent success, Howard University now gets pushed into the upper bracket. Meaning, our competition is now drastically stronger. 

A gambit in a classical tournament?!? Malik devours his opponent in round 4 with a Benko Gambit, ending off the game with 2 queens on the board staring his king down menacingly. Unfortunately, the rest of the team didn't have a hot time with only Samir Acharya securing a draw. Score: [1.5-2.5].

Round 5 ♟♟♟

If we wanted any chance of winning any division award here, our team couldn't afford a loss at this stage. At the very least, we needed to secure a draw. 

In a fierce french with opposite side castling, Malik capitalizes on his opponent's king safety with his H-pawn, forcing his opponent to go down a piece. Xavier Ntamere too delivers a decisive win in the Alekhine with a masterclass in Rook-Pawn endgames. Score: [2-2]

Round 6 ♟♟♟

In the final and most tense round of the tournament, we go for gold. Alternate Lawrence is subbed back in and games begin. 

In a very um.... dubious opening...haha, Malik Castro-Devarona proves why he's the magician of HU in a Smith Morra. Lawrence D. Custis also achieves a win in an agressive Scotch Gambit by storming his f pawn into the kingside of his opponent, leaving the team with a final score: [Score: 2-2]. 

Tournament Conclusion 🦬

While we had a great time at the tournament, the team overall just had tons of draws. While we weren't able to qualify for the overall win in the U1800 section, we were granted the Division V win for best team in the 1400-1599 Rating Category!! 🎉🎊 Not only that, but Malik Castro-Devarona was able to win the 'Best Board 2' award in U1800! With these accomplishments, we finished off the tournament satisfied and flew back home. We thank all our sponsors for helping us get this far, and appreciate all the support that has been given to us. Here's to another year at Pan-Ams, and hopefully a future of more.

Most games can be found within our combined Lichess database: https://lichess.org/study/61nw8fPE/8ecZfKPA

Photo Gallery 📸