At 3:30 p.m. on December 8, the duPont Manual Chess Team took on Central High School in a regular season match at Central. The Crimsons barely came out with the 3-2 victory as David Hess (11) saved the day with his nail-biting win.

It was all tied up at 2-2 so it was up to Hess to bring home the victory. Hess was fairly confident that he was going to win.

“I think I did pretty will since I won, but I think I could have played more aggressively and won faster,” Hess said.

After Hess made the final move his teamates cheered since he won the match for Manual. Hess felt pretty good as he further explains, “It was relieving and felt pretty good when I won because I didnt want to be the one to lose it for our team.”

This match wasn’t as routine as usual given the fact that Manual could only fill four out of the five spots. Manual had to forfeit the fifth board, so they were already down 0-1 before the match even started. Some of Manual’s top players werent there due to sickness and other reasons.