The Barrington (IL) Chinese Immersion Council (BCIC) recently granted approval to a proposal to introduce the game of go to Chinese immersion classrooms in Barrington’s District 220 school district. “I hope that this game-based learning program will not only teach students how to play go,” said Xinming “Simon” Guo, the founder of Go and Math Academy in Chicago, who made the proposal, “but also spark their creativity, imagination, and critical thinking skills, as well as enhance their math abilities”
Xiaoyan Anderson and Zimin Mineo, members of the BCIC Board of Directors, say they hope that through the program, “more families will become involved in our organization, fostering cultural exchange and understanding, and ultimately helping our students become future leaders with an open mind and a global perspective.”
BCIC is a nonprofit organization created in 2014 to support students and families involved in the local school district’s Chinese Immersion Program. The go-related program was scheduled to begin for all third- and fourth-grade Chinese Immersion classroom students with support from teachers Mrs. Zander and Ms. Du during the 2022-2023 school year.
On February 19, 2023, the American Go Honor Society (AGHS) hosted its online Blitz Tournament. The tournament consisted of five rounds and eight divisions consisting of players of all strengths from 20K to 9D. The division winners included Shang Zhou 7D, Al Tang 2D, Jason Liu 2D, Ryan Huang 1K, David Rohlfing 4K, Phillip Briz 5K, Anna Zhou 7K, Brett Li 8K, Roger Ni 13K, and Royal Ni 18K.
Albert Yen 8D, an AGHS alumni, played in division A and described the tournament as a “very well-organized” and “low-stress” event. “My games were rife with mistakes since we only have 10 seconds per move, but I feel lucky that my sole loss wasn’t due to a single blunder,” Yen said, “I am happy I got to play five strong players in just three hours.”
In the future, Yen hopes to see more integration of AGHS events with the American Go Association. “For example, maybe participants in AGHS events can get discounts to go to the Congress to entice participants to attend more Go events,” Yen said. The AGHS hopes to continue hosting engaging events for all Go players. Players may visit aghs.us to stay up-to-date for future tournaments.
“Are you part of a Go school (or a club at school) and would like to play in a team-styled tournament? Well, you’re in luck!” says AGHS President Jenny Li, “AGHS is excited to announce our upcoming tournament: STT (School Team Tournament). This tournament will occur on Saturday, March 25th, and Sunday, March 26th. The registration deadline is Wednesday, March 22nd, 11:59 pm PST. We welcome all youth players (19 and under or currently enrolled in K-12).”
Round Schedule: Round 1: March 25th, 10 AM PST (1 PM EST) Round 2: March 25th, 1 PM PST (4 PM EST) Round 3: March 26th, 10 AM PST (1 PM EST) Round 4: March 26th, 1 PM PST (4 PM EST)
“The AGHS is excited to announce its upcoming online Blitz tournament on Sunday, February 19th,” says AGHS President Jenny Li, “All players are welcome and encouraged to participate! The tournament will encompass 5 blitz rounds during a one-day tournament.”
Registration is now open for the 30th Redmond Cup and 6th AGA Girls Cup, the AGA’s annual premier youth tournaments for North American youth under 18 and females under 16 respectively. Players must have an accredited rank of 1-dan or higher to participate in the Redmond Cup, and an accredited rank of 9-kyu or higher to participate in the AGA Girls Cup. The Redmond Cup features both a Junior (under 13) and a Senior (13-17) division, while the AGA Girls Cup will feature one division (under 16). Both tournaments are online preliminaries to determine two finalists in each division who will be invited to play in a best-of-three match at the 2023 US Go Congress. The American Go Foundation will cover all reasonable expenses for the finalists of both tournaments to travel to and compete at the 2023 USGC. Players who complete all rounds of either tournament will also be eligible for a $200 scholarship to the 2023 USGC.
The new tournament format that debuted last year was met with positive reception by many of the players, and will be used again for this year’s tournaments. This includes a multi-stage preliminary with proctored matches for the latter stages, and mandatory video calls with strict camera setup guidelines for all games.
The 10th annual North American Kyu Championships (NAKC) is now open for registration. The tournament will be held online on the KGS Go Server on Saturday, February 18th and consist of four rounds over the course of one day. Players must be under the age of 18, reside in North America, and be members of their country’s national Go organization to compete. The top junior (under 13 years old) and senior (13-17 years old) player in each of the top two divisions as well as the top two general finishers in each of the lower divisions will win personalized crystal trophies, and the junior and senior champions of the top division will receive an invitation to play in the Redmond Cup, which is traditionally only open to dan-level players. Players who complete all rounds of the tournament will also be eligible for a $200 scholarship to the next US Go Congress, courtesy of the American Go Foundation. Attendance has been strong over the past several years for this tournament with over 100 players each time, and all young kyu players are encouraged to participate!
Those looking for evidence that in-person go events can still attract a crowd need look no further than the Toronto Go Spectacular, held at the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre (JCCC) from December 28 to 30. Organized by the North American Go Federation and sponsored by Deep Mind, the event attracted nearly 200 players and included youth, novice, Open and professional tournaments.
“It was a fantastic event and a real pleasure working with the Canadian team,” said American Go Association president Gurujeet Khalsa. “We are excited to be exploring more possibilities with them for North American cooperation.” “We’ve been talking about hosting a North American go event in Canada for many years,” added Canadian Go Association president James Sedgwick. “I was very pleased the stars finally aligned and we were able to make it happen. The event was all I could have hoped for, and we are especially grateful to all the American participants who made the effort to attend and make this a truly North American event.”
The E-Journal team arrived bright and early for the invitational youth and pro events on Wednesday, December 28. Because only a few competitors were expected, this was the calm before the storm. Sixteen youth players — eight players under sixteen years old and eight players under twelve — arrived from throughout the US and Canada to contest two age group championships. They played a marathon knockout of two out of three matches that lasted for the entire event.
Also arriving on Wednesday were the four professionals battling for the 1st North American Professional Championship, with a $6,000 first prize at stake. Drawing for the initial pairings for the one-round semifinal, Alex Qi 1P of New Jersey drew his teacher Ryan Li 3P of New York, while Andy Liu 1P, also of New York, drew Henry Yu, a Canadian student living in Hamilton, who is certified 2p in Taipei.
The E-Journal broadcast Board One on OGS, where Ryan Li notched a steady and solid win over Alex Qi. At least that was the assessment of In-seong Hwang, one of the two guest teachers, in a lecture that evening. So there was great surprise when AI analysis revealed that Qi had actually held the advantage for most of the game. Meanwhile, on Board Two, Henry Yu made a comeback to win a close game with Andy Liu. (Game records: Semifinal Board One, Semifinal Board Two.)
The other main event began on Thursday, December 29, with the start of the six-round open event, as well as a novice tournament for beginners. When everyone had checked in, there were 184 players participating in the many events. Nick Prince kept check-in and pairings running smoothly with his Leago pairing software, and players could easily find their places either on the huge screen in the playing hall or on their phones.
Meanwhile the kids continued to play in the invitational room, and the North American Pro Championship continued. In the championship round, semifinalists Li and Yu would play a three-game final match to determine first and second place, and Liu and Qi would play a best-of-three match for third place. In the first games, Li defeated Yu, and Qi defeated Liu. (Game records: Final Game One, Third Place Playoff Game One.)
Open players were able to have their games reviewed by guest teachers In-seong Hwang 8d and Mateusz Surma 2p, who also offered his excellent series of kyu level go problems for sale. Food was provided onsite by by the JCCC, saving the players time during the busy event.
The huge and beautiful space of the The Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre was filled with the joyful noise of children, including a contingent decked out in identical blue sweatshirts from the New York Institute of Go, along with three other large groups from Canadian go schools. The largest was Gofun Studio, but We-Go Club and the students of Ms. Mu Miao were also well represented.
The final day, Friday, December 30, brought the crucial games in all the Spectacular’s events. In the morning, in the Pro Championship, Henry Yu evened the final, defeating Ryan Li by resignation, while Alex Qi defeated Andy Liu a second time to secure third place. (Game records: Final Game Two, Final Game Three, Third Place Playoff Game Two.)
Up to this point in the Pro Championship, White had won every game on Board One. “Invincible gote” seemed to be the motto, with pros choosing White every time they had a choice. For the final round on Board One, Ryan Li won the nigiri and, following the pattern, took White. In a very entertaining game, he managed to fend off Henry Yu’s relentless attacks to win a final capturing race. In-seong Hwang’s post-game review produced a riot of laughter from the crowd, particularly from the good natured Henry Yu, who laughed the loudest. Hwang’s lectures were broadcast on the AGA Twitch channel.
U12 tournament report: Waterloo youth Crane Kuo 3d came in as the favorite. Fighting hard to challenge him were Albert Tang 2d and David Fang 2d. They played a tight match with two of three games decided by less than two points, but in the end Tang earned the right to challenge Kuo. In the final match, Kuo won 2-0 with solid wins in both games. “We have played friendly games before and I won a fair percentage of them,” said Tang. “But in this match I had no chance at all. It seems Crane has taken a leap upwards in his playing level, it will be interesting to see what he can do from here.”
U16 tournament report: This event featured four strong 5d players who were expected to be fighting for the title. On one side of the bracket Shengda Tan 5d (a student from Montreal) sailed smoothly through to the final. He has been dominating play in the Canadian league the last couple of sessions, so this strong result was not a surprise. But on the other side of the bracket another Vancouver youth Ben Gong entering as 3d/4d knocked off both Derek Zhou 5d and Yuxin Fu 5d. However in the final Ben Gong could not take down Tan. They played two long and hard-fought games, but in the end the title went 2-0 to Shengda Tan.
Novice tournament report: 41 novice players from 25k-10k competed in a five-round one-day novice tournament. Although the level of play might not have attained that of the other events, the passion to compete was clearly no less, and the joy after victories on the (mostly) young faces was a pleasure to behold.
Open tournament report: The sixth round of the open was the last to finish. 124 players took part, with a very strong field of 25 competing in the championship group for the $1,000 first prize. In the end a tiebreaker was needed between Ivan Lo, Remi Campagnie, and Brady Zhang (a past North American representative in the Globis Cup who has recently started his studies at the University of Toronto), the three top players who finished 5-1; the tiebreaker went in Ivan Lo’s favor, and he took home the title. USA stars Albert Yen and Zhaonian Michael Chen both scored respectable 4-2 results, but couldn’t quite recover from early losses to put themselves in contention. (Selected game records from the Open: Round 2 Board 3, Round 4 Board 2, Round 5 Board 1, Round 6 Board 1.)
The closing ceremonies were hosted by Canadian Go Association President James Sedgwick, with the assistance of Irene Sha, Nick Prince, Sedgwick’s daughter Alice and niece Veronika Keras. American Go Association President Gurujeet Khalsa and NAGF President Andy Okun joined Sedgwick and Prince in awarding trophies, medals and gifts to the winners.
If the Spectacular becomes an annual event, whoever takes the torch from James, Irene, and their team truly will have a tough act to follow.
NOTE: The Open report has been updated; there were no players undefeated after five rounds.
Includes reporting by James Sedgwick. Photos courtesy Keith Arnold, Yunshi Li, Edward Zhang, Cyril Maurice, Shirlie Zhu, Nick Prince, Irene Sha, and multiple parents.
“We are excited to announce the return of the Pair-Go event, our biggest event!” says AGHS President Jenny Li, “Players across the globe of all ages and gender are allowed to participate, and there will be no restrictions on who you can partner up with. The tournament will be held on Sunday, January 15th, 2023 and will consist of 2 rounds held at 1pm and 4pm PST on KGS. The registration deadline is Saturday, January 7th, 2023 at 11:59 PST.”
If you already have a partner, please register using this form. If you are looking for a partner, please register using this form.
Players will be paired up based on rank. Only one person needs to fill out the registration form for each pair. Please email Aghsregister@gmail.com if your registration status changes (e.g. found a partner or need a partner).
For more information on rules and regulations, please read this document:
The 21st World Student Go Championship will be held at the Nihon Ki-in in Tokyo from February 21 to February 22, 2023. The North American Go Federation is now accepting applications for one player to represent North America in this tournament; full airfare, accommodations and meals will be provided by the tournament organizing team.
Eligibility requirements include: Must be a university student under the age of 30 at the time of the tournament; Must be currently enrolled as a student in a university in either Canada or the US. (Students who are studying outside these two countries as exchange students are not eligible.); Must be able to participate in the tournament in person. (Expected to be in Japan from February 20 to February 23, 2023. There will be a reception and pairing drawing on the 20th at 6:30 p.m. Must be able to arrive in time for the reception and drawing.); Must be an amateur player; Must be able to communicate in English or Japanese via email.
To submit your application, please fill out this application form by the end of December 11. Questions? Contact Hajin Lee at hajin.lee@usgo.org.