Justus Williams Wins 1st NextGen Cup By Armageddon Win

The NextGen Cup is a first for Chess.com, but it is not the first tournament of its kind. Efforts to organize tournaments for strong players of African descent can be traced at least as far back as the 1990s, with the African-American Unity Chess Tournaments of 1992 followed by the Wilbert Paige Memorial of 2001 (as covered in detail by Dr. Daaim Shabazz in his article here.)

GM Maurice Ashley, who would become the first African American grandmaster, organized the 1992 tournaments, and he joined our broadcast as commentator over 30 years later, along with Chess.com’s Director of Professional Relations IM Kassa Korley. The grandmaster also recently launched the Maurice Ashley Chess Fellowship, pledging an initial $20,000 of his own, to remove barriers that often prevent young talents from reaching their full potential.

The event featured heavy hitters: child prodigy and author FM Tani Adewumi, Chess in Slums Africa founder and Nigerian NM Tunde Onakoya, South Africa’s first and only GM Kenny Soloman, Brooklyn Castle star Williams, Barbados number-one IM Orlando Husbands, Zimbabwe number-two Mandizha, three-time South African Closed Champion and author IM Watu Kobese, the once youngest African American to get the NM title (at age 12) FM Joshua Colas, reigning Nigerian Champion NM Tersee Ferdinand, and 14-year-old NM Goodness Odey Ekunke.  

Additional guests joined throughout the broadcast: Dr. Shabazz, NBA star Grant Williams, I.S. 318 coach Elizabeth Spiegel and her students, actor Wood Harris, NFL star Chidobe Awuzie, and NM Jerald Times (who played in the 1992 tournaments!).

SPECIAL GUEST – @Grant2Will of the @hornets is on the NextGen Cup broadcast! 🙌 pic.twitter.com/rZr4mn54cy

— Chess.com (@chesscom) February 6, 2025

Let’s jump into the games.

The most exciting finish of the first round happened in an innocuous-looking opposite-color bishop endgame. With the imaginative 53.Kc5!, definitely the move of the round, Colas upset his grandmaster opponent with a piece sacrifice.

Black won all but one of the games in the all-decisive round two. Mandizha went on to 2/2 after the following blunder by Adewumi. Can you find the winning move for White? (35.Re7 is the alternative, but we’re looking for another, flashier move.)

Colas was the last player on a perfect score. On an absolute tear, he was about to score his fifth consecutive win to go to 5/5 with a beautiful game, when he suddenly blundered in his encounter against future winner Mandizha.

Colas, on his way to a 5/5 perfect score, blunders horribly with 41.Nd4??, after such a beautiful game!https://t.co/LCefyvVUBD pic.twitter.com/Gyirorhh7i

— chess24 (@chess24com) February 6, 2025

Fortunately, Colas was able to slip out with a draw. The half-point turned out to be useful for both players later on, even if they wanted more.

That game gave Williams just the break he needed to catch up on 4.5/5. He won his fifth game, against Onakoya, with a 30-move bulldozing against the King’s Indian Defense.

A game later, Adewumi took down Colas; at the same time, Justus won again, in 21 moves against Husbands, to take the sole lead. 20.Qf6! was a nice conclusion to the mating attack, and Black resigned after 20…Nxd1 21.Ne7+. 

Colas and Williams, the hottest players up to this point, met in round seven. It was a fierce battle, but just as things started heating up with Williams’ 20…Qc2! (“This is excellent, dynamic play by Justus,” said Korley), Colas responded with a strong defense and they agreed to an abrupt draw on move 22.

The peaceful agreement didn’t ultimately come back to bite either player too hard, though Ashley several times suggested that such decisions can often backfire badly.

Mandizha won the next two rounds to keep up the pace, a half-point behind the leader before the final game. In round eight, Kobese blitzed out the unfortunate 5…h6? and started shaking his head furiously even before White responded 6.Bxf6. The black queen cannot recapture without losing the d5-pawn, so he captured with the pawn and accepted a “disgusting” structure, as Ashley called it. Unsurprisingly, it fell apart in the long term. 

Mandizha won a third game in a row to finish on 7.5/9, which was enough to ultimately catch Williams in tied first and head to armageddon. Like Williams, he went through the entire round-robin without a single loss.

Williams’ biggest trials came in the last two rounds. Still the leader going into round eight, he was lost several times against Solomon, but the South African grandmaster just couldn’t find the killer blows. In a complete turnaround, after hanging a bishop, Williams swindled a win from an exchange-down position.

Justus, after hanging his bishop, wins with a total swindle to stay in the lead!https://t.co/hzBNJBniyv pic.twitter.com/RzrMfzVGIs

— chess24 (@chess24com) February 6, 2025

Once again, the Bronx-born international master pulled a rabbit out of his hat in round nine, escaping a lost-out-of-the-opening game against Ferdinand to draw and tie Mandizha on 7.5/9. 

Colas won his last two games to finish in tied third-fourth with Adewumi, who started with two losses in four rounds but then won every single one of the last five games.

Every comeback starts with a single game, and that was in round four for Adewumi. Ashley said Adewumi took his older opponent “to school” with the resignation-inducing 22…Nxd4!: “You don’t have to tell Tani twice about these kinds of tactics because he spots them for breakfast and he just dropped …Nxd4 like it’s hot on the board!”

 … he just dropped …Nxd4 like it’s hot on the board!

—Maurice Ashley

The event ended with an armageddon playoff between Williams and Mandizha. The latter won the bid for Black with six minutes, while Williams would be in a must-win game with 10 minutes.

In hindsight, we can say that bidding six minutes and playing the King’s Indian Defense in a must-draw situation was an overly ambitious gamble by the Zimbabwean IM. Williams had a decisive positional advantage but was far from a knockout blow when Black lost on time on move 27, a frankly anti-climactic ending to an otherwise thrilling tournament. 

Mandizha still walks away with $4,000 in second place.

In the interview, Williams said he spent some time playing in South Africa over the board, and he had a hard time playing against Africans playing the Saemish Variation in the Nimzo-Indian Defense. Reflecting on his big scare against Ferdinand in round eight, he gave the advice: “If you play anybody African, don’t play the Nimzo!”

If you play anybody African, don’t play the Nimzo!

—Justus Williams

He also gave us some insight into how difficult the journey is and also how he keeps his motivation:

I haven’t had too many training partners or partners in general. So, this might sound kind of crazy, but it kind of gets lonely, so you kind of get close with God. I am pretty much doing what I feel and I see these [tournaments] as opportunities and blessings… I trust my intuition, same thing in real life.

Korley said he could relate to the loneliness, and so did Ashley who shared the wisdom:

I became an IM when I was 27-years-old, that’s when I became an IM. I didn’t become a GM until I was 33, I didn’t start chess until I was 14. And you talk about that lonely road, it was a lonely road when I was going through it. You can’t give up, you gotta keep believing.

Thank you to everybody for watching the event and reading this report, and happy Black History Month!

How To Review

The NextGen Cup took place on February 6 and featured 10 of the most talented players of the African diaspora compete in a rapid round-robin. The time control was 10 minutes plus a two-second increment. The prize fund was $20,000.

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