Standings Stabilize as U.S. Championships Cross Halfway Mark

After a full-on bloodbath in round five, the players cooled down a bit in the Open section of the 2023 U.S. Championships. With six drawn games, GM Fabiano Caruana remains in the lead with Niemann following closely at his heels, but this doesn’t mean the games were boring.

Caruana holds onto his lead after a tame sixth round, with Niemann still close behind (courtesy Crystal Fuller/SLCC)

Granted some were quite quick draws, but there were a few fighters, including the closest chaser, GM Hans Niemann, who seemed to stop at nothing to try and gain a much-needed victory to catch Caruana. Even with the black pieces against GM Jeffrey Xiong, Niemann refused two repetitions, but Xiong was able to hold with accurate play. In fact, both players played almost perfectly!

Niemann is still half a point behind Caruana, but he will be looking to catch him in the rounds to come. Our two biggest chances at a victory in this section both came from the black pieces.

A perfect game from a pair of youngsters (courtesy Crystal Fuller/SLCC)

GM Darius Swiercz had a chance to utilize his bishop against GM Sam Shankland’s knight to try and gain an advantage in the endgame. However, quick liquidation led to a fairly uneventful draw there as well.

GM Leinier Dominguez Perez had the biggest chance of the round against GM Abhimanyu Mishra when he sacrificed a pawn for the initiative.

courtesy Crystal Fuller/SLCC

Having his pieces stuck in the corner, Mishra was barely able to move, when he slowly untangled, eventually giving back the material and even entering a deficit to make a draw in an opposite-colored bishop's endgame.

After this calm before the storm, we’ll be looking for things to heat up as the leaders try to separate from each other with victories. And as we’ve already seen, nobody is afraid to try with the black pieces!

With stark contrast, there were no fewer than four decisive games in the 2023 U.S. Women’s Championship, with both leaders winning their games with the black pieces as well.

It's not quite a return of "Yippo The Hippo" from the 2021 championship, but it's another hypermodern victory in the books for Yip (courtesy Crystal Fuller/SLCC)

IM Carissa Yip took on FM Ashritha Eswaran with a provocative hypermodern defense that resulted in exactly what she wanted: a fresh game. Despite the dubious nature of her opening, Yip was able to eventually outplay Eswaran in the rising complications, gain a dangerous initiative, and score the full point to put her on 5/6!

On the other hand, her co-leader also kept up. With the black pieces against WGM Atousa Pourkashiyan, WGM Gulrukhbegim Tokhirjonova had her work cut out for her in an extremely drawish endgame, when a series of mistakes from both players in time trouble had the evaluation swinging back and forth.

Tokhirjonova (R) watches the game between Zatonskih and Yu (courtesy Crystal Fuller/SLCC)

As always, the player who made the last mistake lost, and Tokhirjonova was able to keep pace with Yip to set up an exciting rivalry for the rest of the tournament.

We also see that IM Alice Lee is heating up with a win streak and might have a chance to join the lead later down the tournament, while IM Anna Zatonskih rebounded with a win of her own to rejoin the top half of the table.

With this marking the halfway point of the tournament, anything is still possible, but one thing’s for sure: the games will be exciting! In round seven, Caruana plays with the black pieces against Ray Robson, while Niemann takes the white side against Tang. Expect both players to push for a win. Similarly, Tokhirjonova and Yip will both be playing with the white pieces, against Paikidze and Cervantes, respectively, and will both be looking to create more separation from the pack.