38 Champions and Co-Champions Crowned in Spokane

You know 6/7? Well, did you know that over half (21 of 38) of our National K-12 Grade Champions and Co-Champions finished the year of “67” with a 6/7 score?

Of the 13 sections, only five produced clear Champions, and only one of them — Kindergarten winner Zayn Shanmuganathan — finished with a perfect 7/7 score.

This bit of numerology speaks to the many close races on Sunday in Spokane, where many sections came down to the last games to finish in the final round. With annotations and highlights from commentator WGM Sabina Foisor, let’s take a look!

Note: all results are listed in tiebreak order unless otherwise specified.

All photos by Hiedi Bulkley.

With our beloved 6/7 score, New Yorkers FM William Safranek and Jed Sloan are the 12^th Grade Co-Champions.

After drawing their head-to-head game in Round 5 on Saturday, Safranek reeled off two wins on Sunday while Sloan won Sunday morning before drawing Yu-Cheng Liang (WA), who finished clear third with 5½/7, in Round 7.

Erick Zhao won the 11th Grade section outright.

IM Erick Zhao (PA) entered as the highest-rated player of any section, and he leaves Spokane as outright 11^th Grade Champion with a 6½/7 score. After drawing FM Vaseegaran Nandhakumar (TX) Saturday night, Zhao won consecutive games against CM Logan Shafer (TX) and WIM Iris Mou (NY) for a well-earned title.

Ryan Min (WA) took clear second with a 6/7 score, defeating Nandhakumar in a last-round encounter where a Nandhakumar win would have claimed a share of the championship.

Sebastian Suarez took the 10th Grade title back to California.

Second-seeded Sebastian Suarez (CA) won the 10^th Grade section with 6½/7, drawing CM Nikash Vemparala (WA) in Round 6 before winning his final game. Vemparala finished clear second with 6/7. It was a game of inches between the top two finishers, though, as Sabina details:

9th Grade Co-Champions Aditeya Das (L) and Nitesh Cherukuri.

FMs Aditeya Das (NY) and Nitesh Cherukuri (MD) won the 9^th Grade section with 6/7 scores. Das was 4/4 before drawing Cherukuri in Round 5, while Cherukuri had already given up an earlier draw in Round 2. But Cherukuri won both of his games on Sunday while Das followed up his win in Round 6 with a draw against Bobby Qian (NJ), allowing Cherukuri to catch up, although Das still finished first on tiebreaks.

Connor Wang took clear first in the 8th Grade section.

Connor Wang (NY) entered Sunday with a chance of a perfect sweep of the 8^th Grade section, and he did clinch clear first with his Round 7 draw and a 6½/7 performance.

Logjam! Ten players tied for first in the 7^th Grade section with 5½/7 scores: Mason Jin Li (PA), Vidip Kumar Kona (WA, Sivavishnu Srinivasan (CA), Ethan Guo (CA), Elliott Goodrich (NY), Phineas Hugo Weingarten (NY), Anson Leong (NY), Miransh Purven Vyas (TX), Glenn Zhang (CA), and Tarun Sankar (AZ).

7th — From left: Phineas Hugo Weingaraten held Ethan Guo to a draw on Board 1, opening the door for eight more Co-Champions, including Sivavishnu Srinivasan (C) and Vidip Kumar Kona (R).

7th — From left: Phineas Hugo Weingaraten held Ethan Guo to a draw on Board 1, opening the door for eight more Co-Champions, including Sivavishnu Srinivasan (C) and Vidip Kumar Kona (R).

Seven players entered the final round with 5/6 scores, but all three cross-pairings ended peacefully while the seventh player, Owen Pang (NY), lost to Li, who entered with 4½/6. As a result, Goodrich, Leong, and Zhang also managed to catch the leaders. This was the only section where a score below 6/7 was good for a share of first place.

6th Grade out-right winner Liam Liu.

Liam Liu (CA) won the 6^th Grade section thanks to his Round 6 win over top-seeded Ariv Debmisra on Sunday morning.

Four players tied for first in the 5^th Grade section: Aakash Jani (FL), Vivaan Pavuluri (CA), Srihas Sai Sarvesh Maddipati (TX), and Jack Boyer-Olson (NY). Celine Chen (NC) and Olivia Xiu (CA) led the section with 5½/6 entering the final round, but losses to Jani and Boyer-Olson, respectively, gave us the biggest standings shakeup of any section covered so far, with the four Co-Champions each ending up with 6/7 scores.

Samanta - Joseph — Left: Aayansh Samanta against Alexander Joseph. Right: Samanyu Alluri (R).

Four more players tied for first in the 4^th Grade section: Alexander Joseph (GA), Samanyu Alluri (MA), Aayansh Samanta (PA), and Chase Wang (CA). Draws on each of the top four boards (including Joseph – Samanta and Alluri’s game on Board 2) gave Wang a chance to catch the leaders at 6/7 with a win on Board 5.

3rd Grade Co-Champion Brian Ye.

The pattern continued in the 3^rd Grade section: Brian Ye (CA), Taylor Liu (CA), Max Mulholland (NY), and Jordan Kim (NY) tied for first with 6/7 scores. Bo-Yuan Wang (NJ) entered Round 7 as the lone player with 5½/6, but Ye’s win opened the floodgates for as many as five more players to join the tie for first, and Ye’s three Co-Champions were the ones to rise to the occasion and win their games.

Two of the 2nd Grade Co-Champions: Matthew Wang (front right) and Mehmet Yilanli (back right).

Finally, something different! In the 2^nd Grade section, five players tied for first with 6/7 scores: Mehmet Yilanli (OH), Dario Neshvadian (FL), Matthew Wang (CA), Aiden Huang (CA), and Dalton Gorczyca (NY). Rated 1959, Yilanli entered the event as the only player rated over 1600, but Dario Neshvadian (FL, 1345) delivered a 614-point upset in Round 6 to open the door for more players to tie for first.

In the 1^st Grade section, Baoshuo Yao (WA) and Lavin Donadi (NJ) tied for first with 6½/7 scores. Finally, in the Kindergarten section, Zayn Shanmuganathan (TX) posted the only 7/7 score of the weekend.

AAT — Left: Members of the 2026 All-America Team recognized before Round 6. Right: Zoey Tang plays "blindfolded" in the Girls Club Room.

Other highlights from Sunday included honoring members of the just-announced All-America Team, WGM Zoey Tang’s blindfold exhibition in the Girls Club Room, and GM Michael Rohde’s final All-Comers Blitz.