Missouri Wins 2026 President's Cup

March Madness always comes down to the final seconds, whether we’re talking about college basketball or college chess. This year’s President’s Cup was no different.

After a back-and-forth “final four of college chess,” The University of Missouri (Mizzou) won its second President’s Cup in three years. This was Mizzou’s first year hosting the event.

Photo courtesy University of Missouri.

Mizzou’s line-up featured GMs Aryan Tari, Isik Can, Luka Budisavljevic, and Mahel Boyer.

This year’s finalists were Mizzou, Pan-American Intercollegiate champions Webster University, University of Texas at Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV), and Saint Louis University (SLU).

Mizzou won with a total of 7½ game points, ahead of SLU (6/12), which finished second, a half-pointed ahead of UTRGV (5½/12).

Mizzou got off to a hot start with a 3½–½ win over UTRGV in the first round. On the top board, Tari took an advantage into a bishop-versus-knight endgame before GM Gleb Dudin found himself on the verge of equalizing before Tari crashed through.

On boards 2 and 4, both Can and Boyer found themselves with incredibly pleasant positions as Black straight out of the opening. Neither gave their opponent a chance to get back into the game.

The other match of the first round featured an upset, with the Pan-American champs falling 1½–2½ to SLU thanks to GM Viktor Gazik’s win as Black against GM Harsha Bharathakoti.

Round 2 featured the battle of leaders, and, with draws on the top three boards, it all came to Boyer:

Not all draws are equal. Tari drew a perfectly balanced game on Board 1 against GM Aryan Chopra, and Can shook hands with GM Nikolozi Kacharava in only 14 moves on Board 2. But Budisavljevic’s game against GM Viktor Gazik was more of a rollercoaster, and it nearly changed the course of the event:

Thanks to Buidsavljevic’s escape and Boyer’s conversion in Round 2 (and UTRGV’s 3–1 trouncing of Webster in the other match), Mizzou entered the final round with a 6/8 score, ahead of SLU (4/8) and UTRGV (3½/8). A solid showing in the final match would clinch the Cup for Mizzou, while there would be a tie for first if Webster held Mizzou to a low score and either SLU or UTRGV landed a lopsided win.

Despite being reduced to the role of spoilers, Webster showed up. Tari made a mistake early as White against GM Awonder Liang’s Kan Sicilian, and Liang convert smoothly from there.

The other three games were drawn, giving Webster its only point of the weekend. On Board 2, Can was in danger of losing against GM Yasser Quesada Perez, while there were never any chances for either player on Boards 3 and 4.

So, despite entering the round with a two-point lead, Mizzou still did not entirely control its own destiny. A 3½/4 score from SLU or a 4/4 score from UTRGV would produce a tie for first.

On Board 1, Chopra and Dudin drew a queen-and-pawn endgame that maybe offered Chopra and SLU some winning chances. And on Board 4, the game remained perfectly level, also resulting in a draw. As a result, Mizzou's victory was clear, and UTRGV needed to outscore SLU on the other two boards to leapfrog them in the race for second.

Indeed, the other two games each went down to the wire. On Board 2, GM Jose Gabriel Cardoso Cardoso won against Kacharava to give a point to UTRGV:

But on Board 3, Gazik scored the equalizer against Bharathakoti just when it looked like UTRGV was going to clinch the match:

When all was settled, the match was a 2–2 tie, giving SLU the second-place finish by a half-point.

For the first time, this year’s President’s Cup also featured a women’s section with the same format. The field consisted of teams from three of the same universities (SLU, UTRGV, and Webster) along with a team from University of Texas at Dallas (UTD). Mizzou’s two female players — WIMs Tea Gueci and Annmarie Muetsch — provided commentary of the matches.

Led by WGM Thalia Cervantes on top board, SLU blazed through the competition to win the inaugural event with an astounding 10/12 score (including a 3/3 match score). UTD finished second with a 7/12 score, ahead of Webster (4½/12) and UTRGV (2½/12).

SLU defeated Webster and UTRGV each by scores of 3½–½ in the first two rounds before clinching the tournament with a 3–1 win over UTD. Below are my personal favorite victories from each player on the team, presented by order of round:

All games and standings can be found on Lichess and Chess.com.

Editor's note: This article has been updated to reflect the fact that the President's Cup is scored by game points, not match points, and so there was not a tie for second place. Thanks to Dr. WIM Alexey Root for the correction. The scoring system will be explained in her forthcoming book on the President's Cup, The United States College Chess Championship: A History of the President's Cup, which will be available in October.