ISOLATED PAWNS

Although chess club meets every Thursday, it also meets informally on Tuesday nights at Pepperoni Station in Edmond, and again on Wednesday mornings before school in Ida Freeman’s library. As long as students eat breakfast beforehand, they can attend.

By 8 a.m. Nov. 8, discarded backpacks already crowded the aisles, bringing visual disorder to the library’s otherwise symmetric layout. A dozen students sat around three tables, with more filtering in as the minutes passed, eventually requiring games to take place on the floor, and — once the equipment ran out — forcing some kids to settle for observing.

This proved difficult for a couple o<

“Logan,” he said, “may I see your U.S. Chess Federation coaching credentials, please?”

With that, the library got quiet once more. Except for the occasional authoritative scolding and commendation from Nichols as he hovered from game to game, dispensing advice, criticism and praise, whenever warranted.

“Austin, quit saying, ‘Are you sure about that move?’ You asked me if I was sure about that move, and it was smothered mate,” he said, referring to an earlier before-school match in which the boy’s king in check was prevented from escape by his own pieces. “It makes you sound cocky, and people just want to beat you all the more.

“Bailey, don’t take a piece just because you can. We’re looking for something better.

“Aubrey, you almost had ’em last time. Rooks: Protect them like a diamond ring. They’re the most precious thing.

”He also solved problems on the fly. When two students were prevented from starting play because their set was minus a pawn, Nichols simply fished around in his pants pocket, produced a tube of ChapStick, set it on the empty square and said, “Black pawn.” Without another word, he walked off, and the boy advanced the lip balm two squares without giving it further thought.

“Attagirl!” he told one student who was beating her male opponent. “That’s what I mean by active play. You want him to experience stress as early as possible. Now he’s nervous.”

“No, I’m not,” the boy said. “You’re not nervous?” asked Nichols with a glance at the board and a sly smile. “You should be.”

With first period about to start at 8:30, Nichols dismissed the children with a few words of encouragement about the tournament, then 10 days away. He told them he wanted to have no fewer than 40 of them playing.

“If Madison or Jenks comes up here and wins first place in the fifth-grade division and we’ve (only) got 15 kids playing, shame on us,” he said. “We’ve gotta win our own trophies in our own house. They are coming and they would like nothing more than to break our hearts.

”He reminded them of the piece of bent iron that adorns his classroom, an item he has told them stands as a representation of their dreams.

“Don’t let them take our dreams away,” he said. “By the way, girls, if we have three girls medal at this tournament, I’m gonna spray-paint that piece of iron pink. ”This promise excited the girls, more than one of whom shouted back with a plea of “Hot pink!” And with that, the tone sounded designating the start of another school day.

After the kids had filed out to their respective classrooms and quiet flooded the library once more, Nichols began collecting his things.

“This is the only thing we have full participation in, male and female,” he said, noting that everyone from the gifted and talented to the emotionally disturbed and learning lab students comprise the chess club.

As if to prove his point, one backpack was left carelessly behind between the bookshelves. Nichols and club co-sponsor Linda Beasley opened it to determine the identity of its owner — one easily revealed by the only item Nichols produced from it: a single, well-worn sheet of notebook paper. It belonged to one of the emotionally disturbed students, and was filled front to back with annotated chess moves.

“This is his study sheet,” Nichols said, beaming with pride. “The possibility of him going to Nashville (Tenn., for the nationals) has helped control his behavior. ”Added Beasley, “And scared him to death!”

“Our goal is to win the fifth-grade section, but one of my goals is for three girls to medal,” he said. (To medal, a player must win three out of the five games played.) “I had one girl medal in the last tournament, and none before that.

”Historically, chess has been dominated by men. No world champion has even been female, helping to create a stereotype at which Nichols enjoys chiseling away.

“We are really proud of our work with young women and getting them to play at a competitive level,” he said.

During the meeting two weeks beforehand, he gave the girls a little encouragement, saying, “Ladies, I know you feel like you’re getting whupped here lately, like you’re getting picked on. It’s like training with weights: If you lift a 100-pound weight over and over daily, and then all you’re expected to do is lift a 75-pound weight, are you going to be able to do it? Sure you are. So that’s what this is.”

In that same meeting, he also admonished the boys for playing down to the girls: “Gentlemen, there was some talk yesterday about ‘I let her take my queen.’ I cannot tell you how I feel about that. You don’t let anybody do anything. It is disrespectful to your opponent.

”During lunch on Wednesdays, Nichols meets only with the girls.

“I think it helps girls’ self-esteem significantly to play competitive chess. Other things help, too, like athletics, but the expectations of (American) culture are so discombobulated and askew, it’s important to me,” he said, noting that being married to a woman who works in a nontraditional role — that of a Methodist pastor — has helped him to see life through a female perspective.

“I used to tell girls if they beat a boy at a tournament, I’d buy them a banana split at Sonic,” he said. “I had to stop that. It got out of hand — not glycemically, but emotionally.”

One of his female students is Aubrey Haas, age 10. Despite never having played chess until this past August, she has fast become a strong player.

“It’s just really fun because it feels really good when you win,” she said. “(Boys) think that they can beat you, but they can’t always.”

“Every time you move, you have to check king safety,” he emphasized. “The second thing you’re gonna check: How can I do damage? Every move. Make their life miserabler and miserabler as the game goes on.

”Some kids laughed. “Is that a word?”

“Listen, these people are our friends,” continued Nichols, “but while we’re playing, we have no friends. Big Nine, this is your last hurrah for us. Those who are not in the Big Nine, we’ve been standing on their shoulders for two tournaments and they have served us well. It’s time for us to stand on our own now.”

He saved choicer words for the girls.

“Girls, I have hounded you for weeks. I have yelled at you, I have cajoled you, I have treated you shabbily,” he told them. “And you got better. Now, you are not going to go out there and be some timid, mild little wallflower. I want you after people. I don’t want you to be too aggressive, but I want you to be more aggressive than you think is wise. You get to that place, and then just keep it right there.

“Girls, three medals today. And how can we play our best today? What’s the word?” he asked.

“Slow!” came the chorus.

“We have to,” he said. “I don’t care about trophies. I care about you playing the best you can play. And proving to yourself you’re better than you thought you were. All I want you to do today is very simple: Play the five best games you think you’ve ever played. In a row. If you do that … everything else will take care of itself.

”With a few reminders about sportsmanship and a warning about which schools to watch out for, he sent them off.“

I’m proud of all of you,” he said. “This is just another step on where we want to be.

”Properly psyched for mortal combat, the kids rushed for the door. Giacomo claimed to be neither excited nor nervous. “I just want to play,” he said.

In the tournament directors’ room, the final count of participants was confirmed: 257 — the most ever for a state chess tournament. Nichols said this beat the record by about 40, making the stakes even higher.

One of the tournament directors, Albert Rine, a teacher at Tulsa’s Foster Middle School, expressed amazement and a bit of envy at Ida Freeman’s participation level. “It becomes an elite thing. Everybody wants to do it,” he said. “It’s like Tom Sawyer painting the fence.” Rine established a chess club at Foster in 1998, but has nowhere near the interest that Nichols enjoys. In fact, his students were not joining him at the tournament. “It’s a matter of convincing parents that this is cool,” Rine said. “Right now, I have about six parents (who) say, ‘Yeah, this is cool.’

”At Ida Freeman, one of those pro-chess parents is Susan Keethler, whose son James took up the pieces only last year. Already, she said, chess has helped with his math skills, as well as taught him to be a gracious winner and loser. “The club is very active in the school, so everybody wants to be part of it. It’s a rarity, but I think it’s probably because Mr. Nichols and Ms. Beasley have put such a positive twist on it,” said Keethler. “It’s not just for the ‘nerdy’ kids. It’s for all the kids, whether you play sports or you’re in dance or anything else.”

But things don’t always go positively. The fifth-graders breezed through their first three games far too quickly for Nichols’ comfort, so he gathered them on the school porch before the fourth round to “chew their tails.”

“As a team, they’re doing great. Individually, they stink,” Nichols said, during the fifth and final round. “They’re playing too fast. They’re done in seven minutes. You can’t play your best at that speed. I’m rippin’ mad.” As the afternoon progressed, the tournament had its share of other headaches, not helped by the deafening chaos in the halls from kids of all ages running wild. For example, one fourth-grade girl from another school was undefeated before leaving prior to her final game to attend a piano recital. Her mother had the audacity to ask if the entire tournament could be postponed until her daughter returned. It couldn’t, of course, and under the rules, her absence forced a replay of the entire round. Thus, an Ida Freeman student who had never medaled before — and was set to receive her first — lost in the replay, stripping her chances. “Obviously it broke her heart,” said Nichols with a shake of his head. “Welcome to the cutthroat world of competitive chess.”