Last Game of the Year — Draw?
I think this is the first time I was ever in an Internet story. The article must have come out sometime in May 2001 — almost 17 years ago. The National Scholastic Chess Foundation profiled this game because it has an odd ending. The time was running out, and all the kids had already left the round. It was just my opponent and me. We were officially the last game of the year — so that must be the reason for the title of the article. With a few minutes left on the clock, I saw an opening: I could win my opponent’s Queen. The opponent, upset, stopped the game and immediately offered me a draw. I thought, and I thought. Some of the adults (the tournament proctors) came over because it was like “Why doesn’t he just accept or reject the draw?” But I kept looking at it, and pretty soon there was a small circle of people standing at a distance. In the end, I decided to take the draw. I think it totally surprised my opponent, and that was the last game of the year! This article has long since been taken down from the Internet, haha, but I saved it because I was so excited when it came out, and I’m posting it here now since it can’t be found anywhere else. My Dad, now long gone, was the first one who told me about the article and he was super proud, and since I was only in sixth grade at the time, I thought it was a pretty big deal haha!
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The last game to finish in the tournament year. Black is Reserve Section Grand Prix Champion George Hayward. With a few minutes on his clock, he was offered a draw. Let’s take a look:
Black can win the queen with 1…Qxa4, but after 2.Rb7+ Kd8 3.Rb8+ Kd7
4.Rxh8, he would find himself in a queen versus two rooks endgame:
At first glance, Black’s prospects look good, because he can play 4…Qxa3 and try to queen his a-pawn. But after 5.Rg1 White will get a lot of counterplay. Another approach would be to try to harass the h1 rook, which is separated from its mate. Thus 4…Qc4+ 5.Kd2 Qa2+ 6.Kd3 Qf2 7.Rd1 (7.Rb1? Qf5+ winning the rook) 7..a5 (advancing his own pawn further before going after the a pawn) 8.a4 (stopping the advance) and now if Black tries to open another front with 8…f6 9.exf6 gxf6, White gets counterplay with 10.h6.
Black can now try to create another passed pawn with 10…e5, but after 11.Rd2 e4+ 12.Kc2 e3 13.Rxf2 exf2 14.h7 f1Q 15.Rb8
Black must take a perpetual check starting with 15… Qe2+ 16.Kb3 Qd1+
While these variations do not exhaust all the possibilities in the position, they do give a good sense of the chances for both sides.
This brings us back to the original position. With less than 3 minutes left on his clock, George had to evaluate the draw offer by relying on his instincts and intuition. They told him to accept the draw rather than play a dangerous position that he might not be able to win even given a lot of time. And so he did!
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Here was the Web 1.0 version:
