In contrast to many other conference tournaments held January 31 as board-based events, the West Suburban Conference was held as an individual tournament with team tallies for the top eight scores.

88 entrants from nine schools competed. Players were not paired against teammates; all teams entered at least nine with Hinsdale Central and Hinsdale South both entering the most with 14.

When the dust settled Hindsadale Central's Zhen Mo posted the lone perfect score with five wins. He secured his championship with a fifth round victory over Downer Grove South's Bashkim Useni.

Three players were a half-point back at 4.5 including Downers Grove North's Ben Cortez, Glenbard West's Giorgi Vanderway and Oak Park-River Forest's Conrad Manaugh.

Seven players tied for fifth place with 4.0's including a trio from Hindsdale Central: Trevor Huang, Tyler Tompkins, and Nathan Saltzman.

Others in the 4.0 score group included DG-South's Useni, Chris Joseph from Hinsdale South, Glen Leher from York and Philip Linninger from Oak Park-River Forest.

Also contributing to Hindsale Central's championship, all with 3.5 out of 5's were Noah Song, Peter Ren, Yu-Lin Yang, Matthew Tang and Dhruv Chempakasserii (only four of these five counted towards the team total -- take your pick!).

Hinsdale's Central's team score was a remarkable 31.0 out of 40. In the final round, the top scorers on the team (out of 14 entrants) posted four wins, four draws with one loss.

In second was Glenbard West (Glen Ellyn) with 26.5.  Downers Grove North and Hinsdale South (Darien) both finished with 22.5's, with North taking third place with the higher tiebreak.

Hindsdale Central is coached by Dylan Canavan who was named the 2014 Illinois Chess Coaches Association "Coach of the Year".  In his nomination for that honor, his students indicated that Coach Canavan "has taught us not only chess lessons but life lessons. Above all, he shows us how the skills you learn from chess (decision-making, patience, etc.) can be applied to our everyday lives."

Complete results can be seen here.