U.S. Championship, Day 4: So Wins His Second U.S. Championship

As things went, there was very little drama on the last day of the 2020 U.S. Championship, but there could have been plenty! Wesley So was able to get through his two games in the minimum number of moves - 30 per game - and following prep almost from start to finish. (And maybe it wasn't just "almost".) As a result of his draws, first with Ray Robson and then against Hikaru Nakamura, he won the tournament with the very impressive score of 9/11, without losing a single game.

But let's recap. He entered the day with 8/9, a point ahead of Robson and Jeffery Xiong. So had Black against Robson, which could have made things very difficult. Fortunately for him, Robson apparently had nothing prepared against the line of the Berlin So chose, and he went straight into a very drawish variation. So followed previous games most of the way, and by the time he was on his own the task was very easy, and the game finished in a repetition.

That kept Robson a point behind So, but if Xiong won his game against Aleks Lenderman he'd have closed the gap to half a point. He had a chance, too, as Lenderman's 17th move allowed Xiong a nice shot, but he missed it (or missed something in his analysis of that possibility), and Lenderman soon escaped thanks to a nice tactical shot of his own. The game finished in a draw; in fact, every game in the 10th round finished in a draw.

That meant that So could clinch clear first, without any need of a playoff, by drawing his last game. The bad news: his opponent was Hikaru Nakamura. The good news: he had the white pieces, and Nakamura was suffering through a terrible tournament (by his standards), and probably just wanted to get it over. And that's what happened: they followed a game they placed against each other in 2018 for the first 25 moves, and after an inconsequential novelty split the point five moves later. (The earlier game was also drawn in 30 moves, and with the same type of repetition, too.)

That clinched clear first for So. In the race for second, Robson played probably his worst game of the event and was straightforwardly outplayed by Lenderman. Xiong was in serious danger against Alejandro Ramirez early on, and the game was headed for a draw until Ramirez blundered a piece. There's no way of knowing if things would have worked out the same way, had Xiong won in round 10, but if they had there would have been a tie for first and a playoff. It was not to be, but it was still a terrific result for Xiong.

The last day's games of the leaders are here, with my notes, and here are the final standings (kudos to Leinier Dominguez for his comeback in the event, from -2 after the first two days to +1 at the end):

1. So 9/11
2. Xiong 8.5
3. Robson 7.5
4. Dominguez 6
5-6. Shankland, Liang 5.5
7-8. Nakamura, Sevian 5
9. Lenderman 4.5
10. Swiercz 3.5
11-12. Ramirez, Moradiabadi 3