New York’s IS 318 - which, IIRC, is a middle school - won the national high school team title last weekend on tiebreaks. (Not surprisingly, their top three players are - or soon will be - masters.)
Here’s my question: has a middle school team ever previously won the US high school team title? I can’t think of one offhand, but my memory really only goes back to '92.
IS 318 was also one of the short news stories on the Rachel Maddow show on MSNBC on Tuesday evening. Who knows how deeply they fact checked, but they did indicate that the school’s feat was unprecedented.
Congratulations to IS 318!
While they appear to be the first middle school to taste success at High School Nationals, I believe they are pioneers of a trend. In fact, the explosion of younger kids with expert and master ratings keeps growing every year.
Another example: In three of the past five years, the winner of the first place (individual) trophy in High School at CalChess States was a 7th grader or younger.
Michael Aigner
I could have answered my own question. Steve Immitt’s detailed history of the national high school championship through 1996 would appear to support the assertion that IS 318 is indeed the first middle school team to win the national high school team title.
Prior to this, there was a (protested) school that won IIRC the K-3, K-6, and K-8(? Maybe K-9) in the same year. That’s the closest I know.
The school to achieve the feat Mr Bachler speaks of (winning K-3, K-6 and K-9) in the same year (only one official Junior High player was on the team that won the K-9, and the rest were Elementary aged students) was the Shelby School.
As far as I know this school’s accomplishments were never “protested” – except perhaps by the rival teams who came up short against them. The USCF has them listed as the National Champions for all three divisions mentioned in 1998. The Shelby School is a documented Arizona state charter school, located just outside of Payson, Arizona. I was a member of this team, actually winning the K-6 Individual National Championship that year as well. Noted should be that we took that same team to High School Nationals (held in Los Angeles that year) – but sadly a group of mainly Elementary kids could not overcome the odds… We finished in the middle of the pack somewhere at the K-12 Nationals.
Congrats to IS 318 on this amazing accomplishment!!!