Top Seeds Survive Upset Bids in First Round of American Cup

Underdogs, overtime, elimination matches. These words are emblematic of the excitement of March Madness, regardless of whether we are talking about NCAA basketball or the Saint Louis Chess Club (SLCC)’s American Cup. Indeed, the only March buzzword missing from the brackets was many viewers’ favorites: upsets.

After two days of play, the top three seeds in both the Open and Women’s tournaments have advanced to the semi-finals of the Champions Bracket, with the only upsets occurring in the match-ups between the fourth- and fifth-seeded players in each tournament.

But while the bracket was mostly “chalk,” all four quarter-final matches of the Open tournament (along with Lee – Paikidze) were tied after two classical games and had to be decided in blitz playoffs. Below are the current brackets headed into the third day of play, which is currently underway at the World Chess Hall of Fame. 

Read on below for annotations of the “game of the round” and other highlights courtesy of GM Luka Budisavljevic, who will be our guest annotator for the entire event.

Even some of the matches that looked the most lopsided on paper — such as IM Carissa Yip’s 2–0 sweep of WGM Thalia Cervantes — were replete with chances for the lower-seeded player until the last moments. In basketball parlance, I guess these would count as “buzzer beaters.” So, let’s get to GM Budisavljevic’s game of the round:

Yip’s second game was no less colorful, as evidenced by this key position highlighted by SLCC on X:

Madness in Cervantes vs. Yip, but of course it's 0.00!https://t.co/WF31BdfVIs#AmericanCup pic.twitter.com/R2jpAGx1q3

— chess24 (@chess24com) March 16, 2025

As mentioned, the only match in the Women’s tournament to go to “overtime” was second-seeded IM Alice Lee’s eventual 3–1 win over IM Nazi Paikidze. After winning in style on Saturday, Paikidze bounced back in tactical style:

Check out this beautiful tactical idea!White to play and win! Can you find the continuation?

Stay tuned with the broadcast for the solution⬇️https://t.co/RlKMXWVn8O#americancup @chess24com pic.twitter.com/W2dO0s8wwX

— Saint Louis Chess Club (@STLChessClub) March 16, 2025

Lee goes on to face GM Irina Krush, who won 1½–½ over WGM Atousa Pourkashiyan. 

Yip will face fifth-seeded WGM Tatev Abrahamyan, who won her “coin-flip” match-up against fourth-seeded IM Anna Zatonskih 1½–½ thanks to her fine victory with the black pieces on Sunday:

Since the format is double-elimination, below is the Elimination Bracket for the Women’s tournament:

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Graphic courtesy of SLCC

Starting with the top seed of the Open tournament, it wasn’t easy for GM Hikaru Nakamura against GM Abihmanyu Mishra. After two draws (including one nervy endgame) in the Classical portion, Mishra won with the black pieces in the first blitz game. 

Absolute joy from Mishra as he wins the first blitz game with Black against Nakamura! If he draws with White next, he advances in the Champions Bracket!https://t.co/YcM0eBSk8c#AmericanCup pic.twitter.com/lMYGqxAXYk

— chess24 (@chess24com) March 16, 2025

All Mishra needed was a draw as White to banish Nakamura to the Elimination Bracket and be this year’s “Cinderella,” as he would be termed by basketball fans.

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The dramatic conclusion to the final game of Mishra – Nakamura (Photo courtesy Lennart Ootes/SLCC)

In the key game, Nakamura’s experience pushed Mishra’s nerves to the brink. Eventually, an unfortunate blunder after a few inaccurate time-scrambled decisions gave Nakamura the equalizer he needed to eventually go on to win 3½–2½:

The tie-breaker format for this tournament features two sets of blitz, followed by another two sets of blitz, and, if things are still tied up, finally an Armageddon game. But only one match in the first round made it this far, and it happened to be the other “coin flip” match-up between the fourth- and fifth-seeded players. Here, it looked like GM Leinier Dominguez was going to have a hard time winning on demand with the white pieces against GM Wesley So until …

On the other side of the bracket, second-seeded GM Fabiano Caruana won 2½–1½ over GM Ray Robson by breaking through in the second playoff game after three consecutive draws that included some near-misses:

Caruana will face third-seeded GM Levon Aronian, who defeated GM Sam Sevian 4–2 by winning both games of the final set of playoff blitz games after almost blundering away the match earlier in the day. 

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It wasn't easy, but Aronian avoided the upset to advance to a semi-final date against Caruana (Photo courtesy Crystal Fuller/SLCC)

Below is the Open Elimination Bracket:

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Graphic courtesy of SLCC

The tournament continues through Sunday, March 23, with the American Cup Blitz to take place on the 24^th. The full schedule can be found here, and all games can be found on Chess.com. Live commentary courtesy of SLCC can be found on Twitch and YouTube, featuring commentary from GMs Yasser Seirawan and Christian Chirila along with IM Eric Rosen and WGM Katerina Nemcova.