Thanks to the New Jersey State Chess Federation and all the organizers of the US Amateur Team East. They did a great job running an event with almost 1300 players.
You can find all the prize winners on the njscf.org site. I used some Excel tricks on the wall chart data to find some other stats:
306 teams participated this year, up from 277 last year. The median team rating was 1589.
There were 55 teams rated over 2000, 45 over 2100, and thirteen over 2190. Unlike last year there was only one team rated 2199, and none with the maximum 2199.75.
At the other end were 21 teams rated 1000-1199, 46 below 1000, and four teams of all unrated players.
The higher-rated team won 692 of 885 matches (78.2 percent) and lost 126 (14.2 percent) with 67 ties (7.6 percent). More than half of the matches paired teams rated at least 351 points apart.
Upsets are naturally much less common at the team level, because the underdogs have to score on at least two boards just to tie a match.
The higher-rated player scores about 75 percent when there’s a 200-point difference in a single game. In a hypothetical match of four of these games, with no draws, the underdogs would only win 13 of 256 matches (5 percent) and tie 54 (21 percent) while losing 81 sweeps (32 percent). In practice, draws and different rating combinations made it less favorable for the favorites. Underdogs by 150-249 points won 11 percent and tied 18 percent of 266 matches (28-49-189).
The biggest upset was LVCA ROOKS (929) won 3 - 1 over PUTIN’S GAMBIT: OPEN FILES… (1484)
The biggest upsets with the underdogs winning 4-0 was WPP Knights (930) over Pirate Chess (1249)
and CHESSAHOLICS 2 (1676) over WEST CHESTER UNIVERSITY (1923)
The biggest tied-match upset was between CKQ Future Stars (1075) and MATE WITH INITIATIVE (1743).
Two teams scored two big upsets.
LVCA ROOKS also won 2.5 - 1.5 over TRUMP’S RUSSIAN UNORTHODOX DEFENSE (1445)
GILL ST BERNARD KNIGHTS (1019) tied with PLAY LIKE A GIRI (1563) and won 3.5 - 0.5 over ICA 8 (1522). It’s no surprise they won the under-1200 prize.
Other significant upsets:
CKQ DREAM TEAM (533) 3.5 - 0.5 EWING TEAM D (1056)
53X109 (1313) 2.5 - 1.5 WILSON MAGNET SCHOOL (1837)
ICA 11 (1298) 2.5 - 1.5 SCHENECTADY CC B (1812)
Also, ties between:
LOGIC GROUP (1110) and RUSSIA CAN’T HACK IT AGAINST… (1745)
BOARD OF BAD PAWNS (975) and BOOK OR NOT TO BOOK (1523)
LI WIZARDS (ONCE I WAS 7) (969) and PEACE N BLESSINS (1527)
Another Win By Belichick-mate (1643) tied with US CHESS TRUST (2157)
PLAYERS OF CURRYBBEAN (1647) tied with TRUMPOWSKY FOR DEPLORABLE (2155)
(A Tribe Called Chess 3 had three 2-2 ties with teams rated 600+ points higher, but their 532 rating didn’t include an unrated player who scored 4-2 on board 4.)
The most balanced team was Don’t Fianchetto in My Piano, with ratings from 1983 to 1900.
The most unbalanced team, by almost 800 points, was Deep Sugar, rated from 2507 to 206. This put Ruby Mercure on the short end of the two biggest mismatches of the weekend. First, she faced Philip Keisler (1926) in round 1. Then two teammates had to withdraw suddenly before round 4, and she was moved up to board 2 against me (2007). She is much better than her rating, but not enough to overcome differences like those.
Individually, there were 3219 games between rated players. The higher-rated player won 2223, lost 467, and drew 529.
Highest average opposition (6 games vs. rated opponents):
Board 1
David Brodsky, 2397
Ethan Li, 2368
Carissa Yip, 2344
Gregory Markzon, 2342
Hans Niemann, 2333
Paul Fielding, 2322
Aaron Jacobson, 2300
Board 2
Daniel Miller, 2193
Wesley Wang, 2192
Board 3
Ethan Klein, 2133
Roshan Idnani, 2060
Board 4
Roberto Jose, 1895
Jason Li, 1893
I posted re-formatted charts at tinyurl.com/usate17-2 (.pdf files on my very primitive Chess From Square Two site.)
I hope this long post was interesting.
– Dean Howard