Lakeside chess team wins second state championship

The Lakeside High School chess team won its second consecutive state championship this year and the team’s sponsor, Heather Slay, and the coach, her husband, David Slay, attribute the success to practice and strategy.

David Slay said the team formed four years ago, and “our first team was all seniors.”

“We did OK but didn’t win a state championship or anything and then the whole team graduated,” he said. “The second year I started over.”

He said since the second year, many of the teammates continued to play year after year, resulting in two consecutive state championships.

Lakeside’s team was one of 12 invited to the 2012 championships and one of 11 that competed in the April 21 event at Harding University in Searcy. The 2011 tournament was held in Hot Springs at the school.

Heather Slay said the team received an invitation to the state championship because of its performance at the regional tournament Feb. 18 in Benton.

“They have two regional tournaments,” he said. “One is held in the north part of the state and the other in the south, and anybody ( high school team) can come. You just need a team of at least four students.”

David Slay said he started a team because, “chess has been my hobby for years.”

“Heather and I had talked about there not being a chess team ( at the school), and when I heard there was a scholastic state

championship in Arkansas, I mentioned to her I could coach a group,” he said.

Heather Slay, a Lakeside English teacher, said about 20 students are a part of this year’s team.

“If you play chess and have studied it, it’s easy to come in and try to tell the kids how to be good, but what is hard is keeping them interested and motivated,” David Slay said, adding the team practices together about once a week.

He said he encourages each student to play at least one game a week and when they meet, they review past games they have played. He said the team is open to any students at the school.

“There’s a website they play on, so I can review their games,” he said. “When we meet once a week, I pick one or two of their games, and we go all the way through that game and I show them what they did well on and where they made mistakes.”

Slay said he tries to select two games each week from two separate students because, “I want to go over fundamentals from a beginner’s game and then I pick one of the more experienced member’s games.”

LHS senior, Connor Anderson, 18, said the team will begin practicing on chess boards one to two months before they begin competing.

“It is different,” he said of competing online versus with a physical board. “When you’re playing online, there isn’t as much of a risk. When you play on a board, you play a better game.”

LHS junior, Dillon Self, 17, said that during a chess game, each per- son receives 45 minutes to finish.

“Each guy has a clock with 45 minutes on it. If both guys use all of their time, a game would last an hour and a half,” David Slay said. “If your timer runs out, you lose so there isn’t any counting of the pieces or deciding it could be a tie because the timer would run out.”

He said using timers in tournaments makes the game “more exciting” because, “with a room full of people being quiet, there’s actually a lot of adrenaline. They have to learn how to control that.”

He said the students are taught to use the Caro- Kann defense, a common opening defense strategy for a chess game.

“The first eight moves are to create a structure,” he said of the strategy. “It’s hard to beat. A lot of the guys have gotten so good at playing a defense and they win their games on defense.”

He said the team’s offense structure, the Queen’s Gambit, is “very similar.”

“The way players attack on offense isn’t much different from the way you defend with the Caro- Kann, so that’s why I chose it,” he said.

David Slay said school’s officials have agreed to hang a banner in the gymnasium to honor the team members, who will be receiving state championship rings.

He said next year will be the team’s second year to hopefully compete in the United States Chess Federation Super Nationals in April 2013 in Nashville, Tenn., the “Olympics of chess.”

“Super Nationals is a national tournament held every four years, and it’s a kindergarten through 12th grade tournament,” he said. “We went four years ago with my very first team and there were about 5,000 competitors.”

Heather Slay said the team placed ninth in the nation that year.

David Slay said playing chess is beneficial for the participating students because, “there are studies out there that say playing chess improves academic performance.”

“It’s a great pastime, and we’ll be playing in the band room when we have free time,” Anderson said. “It really brings people together.”

“It’s really a universal game,” LHS senior, Tanner Devork, 18, said. “You can go to another country and even if you don’t speak the same language, chess is a universal language.”