For the second straight year, The University of Texas at Dallas will host the most exclusive event in college chess.
The 2025 President’s Cup will be held April 4-6 on the UT Dallas campus, with competitors squaring off in the McDermott Suite in the Eugene McDermott Library and match viewing available in the Gaming Wall Lounge in the Student Services Building Addition.
The Comets will face UT Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV), Webster University and Saint Louis University (SLU) in the pinnacle event of the chess season.
“It is exciting for us to be able to host this prestigious college chess event two years in a row,” chess coach Julio Catalino Sadorra BS’13 said. “This bid award is an endorsement from US Chess and its College Chess Committee of UT Dallas and our chess culture, and the way we organize collegiate tournaments. We plan to make the matches more visible this year, so I hope more students and visitors will follow them.”
Seniors Ivan Schitco and Balaji Daggupati, graduate student Andrei Macovei, junior Karolis Juksta and sophomore Koustav Chatterjee will represent UT Dallas, which qualified for the President’s Cup for a record 20th time by finishing second at the Pan-American Intercollegiate Team Chess Championship in January.
Created by Dr. Timothy Redman, professor emeritus of literature, the President’s Cup was first held in 2001 and has been hosted by UT Dallas five previous times.
Before the President’s Cup, the UTD chess team will travel to Brownsville for the March 1 Southwest Collegiate Team Championship, a three-board team event that will pit the Comets against their regional rivals, including UTRGV and Texas Tech University.
UTD Wins Kasparov Tournament Cup
The UT Dallas A team took first place at the fifth annual Kasparov Chess Foundation University Cup in early February. The winning team featured Schitco, freshman Aditya Samant, senior Rahul Srivasthav Peddi and sophomore Vignesh Anand. Event rules required that teams’ average player ratings be under 2400.
ChessFest
UTD will celebrate chess on campus starting Feb. 24. Visit the Comet Calendar for the schedule of events.
UT Dallas prevailed in a playoff final over Gunadarma University in Indonesia. As winners, the A team will receive a training session from former world champion Garry Kasparov.
The online event featured 111 teams from 59 universities — including UTRGV, SLU, the University of Missouri and Texas Tech — representing 25 countries.