Chess Team: Why you should consider joining

The Princeville Chess Team has had an eventful and exciting season- and as the final tournament creeps near the members are hard at work practicing. 

Practices take place from 3:30-4:50 on Tuesdays after school. “Our practices are set up to give the students time to play against each other and/or to play online. This allows our players to share their ideas with each other, while also providing some friendly competition. Our HS players practice online against the Brimfield HS players as well.” says Mrs. Keyster, the chess team coach. Believe it or not- there’s about 10 chess members in total (not counting the Brimfield high school players.) 

Speaking of high school Brimfield players- according to Mrs. Keyster, “...We actually were able to form a co-op with Brimfield HS this year, which allows our high school members to compete at the IHSA Chess events. We haven’t had a high school team for several years since we didn’t have enough players interested in participating...” Basically- thanks to Brimfield we’re able to have a high school chess team.

Another amazing part of the chess team are the tournaments. This year, “The PJHS Chess team won 2nd place at the Liberty Winter Chess tournament on January 11 in Peoria…” and “Several of our players also earned individual medals.” The high school team tournament ended with both Princeville members earning medals as well. “Hunter Keyster played board #5 on the Varsity Team, and he won 4th place amongst all the Board #5 players. Rhythm Patterson played in the HS Open, and he won 4th place overall.” Brilliant work from the chess team and their coach. 

Mrs. Keyster says that if you’re considering joining the chess club- “The only requirement to be in the Chess Club is to have an interest in playing and/or learning how to play chess… Our tournament players also have to be willing to attend tournaments and learn notation.” and that,  “The Chess club is a really fun group that enjoys having fun and competing with other students. We compete at different tournaments throughout the year which allows our players to meet and compete against other school’s teams too.”

Thanks to Mrs. Keyster for answering any and all questions I had for her and providing the images of the team.