I’m taking a group of students down to the state 5–8 tournament this weekend. They will be competing in the eighth-grade section of a seven-round board Swiss, in which each board is run as a separate individual Swiss tournament, rather than teams facing teams. Thus, our first-board player will be up against all the other first-board players, and only the other first-board players, and so on. It’s clear to me which three of my players belong on the top three boards. However, I’m starting to second-guess the order I’ve assigned them in.
Based on their team ladder performance, their USCF ratings, their tournament performance to date and the results of a three-round qualifier, I originally assigned (not their real names) Dallas to first board, Jonah to second and Trevor to third. The order coincided with my gut instinct. However, at yesterday’s practice, Dallas seemed to have qualms about being placed on first board, while Trevor felt he ought to have gotten better than third.
Here are some of the data points to consider:
Playing against each other, Jonah usually beats or at least draws against Dallas, Dallas and Trevor are about equally matched, but Trevor consistently beats Jonah.
Against other young players, Jonah has the best tournament record – in a recent regional interscholastic, Jonah went 5.0/5, while Dallas went 4.0/5 and Trevor went 3.0/5. However, Jonah is a fifth-grader and was playing in a grade 3–5 section. Dallas in in sixth grade, and Trevor is in eighth; they were playing in the 6–8 section. So comparing Jonah’s score to theirs isn’t apples-to-apples. (Dallas’s only loss, BTW, was to a local third-grade prodigy who routinely beats me. However, because he faced the prodigy, he didn’t go up against any of several other first-string players to whom he probably would have lost as well.)
Jonah also has the best USCF rating, 17 points over Dallas’s (not statistically significant). Trevor’s is 100 points below Dallas’s, but it’s provisional, based on only three games; because of other commitments on past tournament days, he hasn’t really been tested yet.
Dallas is king of the ladder. Trevor got ahead of him for a bit, but Dallas has taken it back. Jonah is behind both of them, but this is partly because he rarely gets to challenge up – other players keep challenging him from below.
Where they differ most is in temperament. Jonah, the fifth-grader, has patience and focus beyond his years and will not be rushed into a move. He takes the time to make sure the moves he makes are safe, and he has a good tactical eye. However, his lack of experience shows in some of the choices he makes. He rarely blunders but makes a fair number of single-? mistakes. Dallas, the sixth-grader, is a naturally strong player, but his attention span is poor. When he’s dialed in, he’s deadly; when he’s not, he’s sloppy, moving much too fast and hanging pieces left and right. Of the three, he’s also most susceptible to failure spirals when he performs poorly. He can be immature and doesn’t like to confront his own shortcomings; he blames his failures on factors outside himself. Trevor, the eighth-grader, is the most mature, but he acknowledges that he tends to miss possibilities; also, he’s still prone to making moves that have no strategic value, simply because he’s not sure what else to do. He has a lot of confidence against younger players but falters against players his own age.
Jonah and Noah both played in their respective grades in the Illinois Chess Association All-Grade Championship back in November. Jonah had an OK day – he went 2.0/5, but his rating rose 150 points. Dallas suspected his opponents of cheating and flamed out. Jonah has progressed significantly since then. Dallas, not so much.
Assuming – as I suspect is likely – that these three players are too close to one another in strength to rank them unambiguously, should I stick with my original order? Should I perhaps assign them Trevor-Jonah-Dallas, based on how they’re likely to perform under pressure? Or is there another order I should consider?
BTW, just to put this into perspective, this is these kids’ first year ever playing tournament chess; it is, in fact, the first year our school district has ever had a chess program at all in the middle schools. The fact that, after just four months, our team has already risen above all but a handful of schools in the region (and that handful includes two schools for the gifted) reflects well on these students’ talent, enthusiasm and dedication. So I don’t want to detract from any of their accomplishments by pointing out where they still need to grow. Mainly, I just want to give us a fighting chance at state while girding myself against accusations of stacking.
One thing to also know is that the boards are weighted. First is worth 10, second 9 and down to fifth being worth 6. So if A would take 3/5 on first and 5/5 on second while B would take 3/5 on second and 1/5 on first, it would score more points to have A on first.
In the CICL (adult league with 6 unweighted boards) I consider myself slightly weaker than another player, but I put myself on a higher board because my streakier play gives me a 65% chance on 2nd board vs a 70% chance on 3rd while he would be maybe 70% on 2nd vs 90% on 3rd.
If I’m on my game I’ll probably win regardless of the board and if I’m off my game I stand a good chance to lose regardless of whether it is board 1 or 2 or 3, and there have been a number of times where I’ve won on board one while a higher-rated player drew on board two. So I take the die roll on my board and improve our chances on the other board. Of course, as the captain I don’t have to worry about complaints from the player (me) that I thus sometimes throw to the wolves.
Getting back to your situation, the board weighting was designed to be a penalty against teams that are stacking, so complaints against you immediately face an automatic partial defense. Since the three players are so close in strength, the key may turn out to be the boards they are willing to play. Since it is not USCF rated, you can emphasize the tournament experience that they will get.
Naturally, I thought of the game-theory approach, but unfortunately, I just don’t have a good basis for knowing what the players’ odds are on each board, partly because I don’t know what the competition will be like. And I am interested in maximizing my team’s performance by whatever means are available and ethical.
In a head to head match, the odds are easier to determine. With the Board Swiss, the gains from one player to the other are quite possibly minimal and would vary from day to day depending on how the players are feeling that particular day.
As an example, my son played in a HS team/individual event with all of the boards in the same section. Normally board 6, he scored 3.5/5 while board one scored 5/5. I am guessing that even if he had played only board one players from other teams, he would still have faced some weak board ones and pulled out one or two games. He also went 3.5/7 at the IHSA state team event playing other board sixes, but board sixes that were on teams playing on the upper tables (he was sick, so if he had been healthy he might have gotten another point). I think he would have done significantly better with a Board Swiss.
I don’t know the numbers that will be at the IESA event, let alone the strength of the players. This may be a case where having the players comfortable with their sections may be much more important than any odds determination.
Given the amount of information on the players, as long as the tournament rules do not require that they be placed on a board by rating, I would select their board order on their level of maturity. In this case, I would select Jonah - Trevor - Dallas for the top three boards. Jonah appears to be the most mature and has the stablest results. Trevor also appears to be stable and hungry to play. Dallas, by your account, shows unease at being on board one, but he could be devastating on Board 3. Putting the 8th grader, Trevor, on Board 2 and the 6th grader, Dallas, on Board 3 appears logical. In putting together scholastic teams, I look for “anchors” who will steady the team. Often the 3rd and 4th Boards have to be the point producers while Boards 1 and 2 have to be able to hold and not lose.
In team play, I have found that the team chemistry often trumps ratings. That is true for adult as well as scholastic team tournaments. In our chess league, we have a 70 point rule. Players within that point range may be switched in board order for the year. This helps teams to take into account the actual strength of the players without unduly stacking the teams.
I think both Dallas and Trevor would go negative if I put Jonah on first board, and that’s a whole lot of responsibility to place on the shoulders of a fifth-grader.
This is an unrated, non-USCF tournament, so ratings don’t enter into it except in my head.
Having spent the better part of yesterday going around and around on this, I’m now thinking Trevor - Dallas - Jonah. All three are good, but none is great, so first board is going to be a struggle whomever I put there. Based on your advice and Jeff Wiewel’s, I conclude that I should optimize for second and third. Thus, Trevor will be our sacrificial lamb on first board. He told me he feels that he plays better under pressure, because it focuses him and forces him to look for the things he might otherwise miss; if he rises to the occasion, so much the better. Dallas, on second board, will be free of the responsibility of taking on the heaviest hitters, and his ego won’t be hurt by being seated behind Jonah, so he’s more likely to play at his peak ability. As for Jonah, I can tell him, “You probably would have done well on second board. You will do well on third board,” and he’ll knuckle down just as he would have otherwise, and most probably get an even better score. I may be a little bit guilty of stacking, but considering that Trevor is in eighth grade, Dallas in sixth and Jonah in fifth, the ordering will look absolutely natural.
If I’m dead wrong about this, I have one last opportunity to change the lineup, Friday morning at registration.
A quick look already shows 37 5th-8th grade teams and 42 5th-7th grade teams (33 of the 46 schools are fielding both types of teams). That would make for around 400 players (maybe more since multiple players per team are allowed in the fifth board section). With seven rounds, they will probably NOT be accelerating the pairings in any of the sections.
400 players may not match the numbers of the ICA-authorized individual/team K-8 championship (genererally in excess of 600 and occasionally in excess of 800), but it probably does exceed the numbers of the 5th-8th graders in that tournament.
It sounds like Dallas is a very streaky player. That can be good & it can be bad. It may not be worth the risk of having him on board 2. You could justify putting Jonah on board 2 based on the head-to-head between Jonah and Dallas. Also, you could point out that next year Jonah and Dallas will have to move up 1 board. Thus, the question becomes who will be board 1 next year? That could be a big consideration for the long term success of the team. Maybe if you ask Dallas about it he would decline board 2 this year if it means board 1 next year against 8th graders. Let him know you want him to be comfortable, and you want his input on the decision. Finally, of course you want them all to have fun.
It turns out there are 29 first boards in the 5-7 section (155 players) and 26 in the 5-8 section (134 players), with 289 total players. That would exceed the number of 5th-8th graders in the ICA-authorized 2009 state K-8, be about the same as in 2010 and be less than 2008. Rounds 1-3 were played on Friday and rounds 4-7 will be played today.
P.S. Daniel Wright of Lincolnshire and a perennial power in the ICA-authorized state championship is currently leading both sections with perfect scores.
I did end up assigning “Trevor - Dallas - Jonah,” and now it can be revealed: We won fourth place in our section, out of 34 schools. (One of the three that beat us was Daniel Wright.) Alec, on first board, stepped up and finished in the middle of the pack; Austin, on second, finished sixth, just out of medal contention; and Noah, on third, earned himself a fourth-place medal by taking out a Daniel Wright player in the seventh round. (Check out the difference in theirratings!) I couldn’t be prouder of how they performed this weekend.
(Check out the difference in