2023 PCL Prediction Contest: Last Chance To Win

[The winners have been announced, and the competition is over! Click here for details.]

The 2023 Pro Chess League Finals are upon us! Eight teams have made it through to this final stage, and will be competing for their part of the $150,000 prize fund. Whether you're a grandmaster or not, YOU can also win prizes as part of the Pro Chess League. Specifically, you can compete in our prediction contest and have a chance to win Chess.com memberships and other amazing prizes.

If you've been playing so far, you might be up for the overall prize at the end of the competition. Even if you're only now seeing this for the first time, you can still get your hands on special prizes including Chess.com memberships.

How To Play

Simply go to this form and fill in your predictions for the week. What will the smallest margin of victory be? How many games will start with 1. e4? How many Sicilian Defenses will be played? Questions will vary each week. If you get the correct answer, you’ll receive a point. 

Prizes will be awarded on a weekly basis as well as an overall prize at the end of the competition, so there’s always something to play for, no matter what your previous results were.

Every week will also feature an especially difficult question at the end that will challenge even the best and brightest among us. This question is the tiebreaker that will help decide the winner if needed.

Even if the chess action doesn’t go how you thought it would, you still have a chance to win a three-month Diamond Chess.com membership just by supporting your favorite team. Pick your team in the form and repost the auto-generated graphic on social media (using the hashtag #prochess) to enter the draw!

Best of luck, and enjoy the 2023 Pro Chess League! We’re looking forward to seeing your predictions.

Enter Your Predictions

Weekly and overall prizes are as follows:

Note: This contest is void in all areas where prohibited by law.

Procedures for Contacting and Announcing Winners and Giving Out Prizes

We will be in touch with winners through Messages on Chess.com or via the e-mail provided in their submission.

Contact will be made within one calendar week after the contest ends.

If prizes are given out continuously throughout an event, contact will be made one week after the event ends.

In contests where winners are picked randomly from chats on Twitch, YouTube, and Chess.com, everyone who gave the correct answer will be raffled using software that will ensure an impartial and random selection of winners.

By participating in the event, you are consenting to Chess.com using your name/image for purpose of administration, prize fulfillment, use in a publicly available winners list, and related Chess.com event promotion.

Read more about our policy for contests in Giveaways, Games of Chance, and Sweepstakes.

NB: If you have received no contact after a week, you can claim your prize by contacting [email protected]. 

Final Results

The winner of the last individual stage of the PCL Predictions contest is HotSauceCracked.

The overall winner of the competition is Fazer180 with 40 points and a correct guess of who would win the 2023 PCL!

Kevinbaer also reached 40 points, and answered just as many tiebreak questions correctly, but did not accurately predict who would win the PCL. Due to how close this result was, they will receive a consolation prize.

Congratulations to our winners, and thank you to everyone for participating! Stay tuned for other exciting contests coming up.

Results for Week 5 PCL Predictions:

What will be the smallest margin of victory in Week 5?
Over 1.5: No matches went as tight as 1 point this week.

What will be the largest margin of victory in Week 5?
Under 5.5: No matches went into blowout territory this week, so the Under gets it.

What will be the margin of match victory between the Garden State Passers and MGD1 in Week 5?
Over 2.5: Garden State Passers vs. MGD1 ended in 6-10 for a margin of 4.

How many decisive games (a won/lost game) will we have between the Arch Bishops and the Bulldogs in Week 5?
Under 11.5: There were 10 decisive games.

How many brilliant moves will we see between Canada Chessbrahs and Blitz (on depth 20) in Week 5?
Under 4.5: There were 3 brilliant moves in this match.

How many matches will go to tiebreak (more than 4 rounds) in Week 5?
Under 0.5: No matches went to a tiebreak.

How many openings with “gambit” in the name will we see in Week 5?
Under 6.5: There were 6 games with “Gambit” in the name.

How many times will we see a king move to e2 or e7, the infamous Bongcloud squares, in Week 5?
Over 23.5: The king moved to e2 or e7 a total of 25 times.

How many bishops will the Arch Bishops sacrifice in Week 5?
Under 1.5: One bishop was sacrificed by the Arch Bishops

How many games will last more than 100 moves in Week 5?
Over 0.5: One game had more than 100 moves (118 moves)

Pro Question: How many games will will the Canada Chessbrahs win in Week 5 and how many moves will it take in total?
Answer: The Chessbrahs had 5 wins and 189 moves in those games.

This week’s winner is ichinese with 9/10 correct answers, who answered the tiebreak question with 5 wins and 214 moves.

The finals are coming soon! In case you're wondering how you're doing so far, you'll find the current top 10 below, and the full leaderboard right here. 

1. kevinbaer (34 points)
2. Fazer180 (33 points)
3. xtrudox (33 points)
4. Neededaname (31 points)
5. stevis5 (31 points)
6. 7ania7 (28 points)
7. UncleButchy87 (28 points)
8. gonzo265 (28 points)
9. SeaBones2006 (27 points)
10. Zwellop (27 points)

Results for Week 4 PCL Predictions:

What will be the smallest margin of victory this week?
Under 1.5: The smallest margin of match victory was between Blitz and the Brazil Capybaras, which ended in 10.5 - 9.5 for a margin of 1.

What will be the largest margin of victory this week?
Under 5.5: The largest margin was between the Croatia Bulldogs and Shanghai Tigers. The match ended in 6 - 10 for a margin of 4.

What will be the margin of match victory between the Canada Chessbrahs and Levitov Chess Wizards in Week 4?
Over 2.5: The match ended in 6.5 - 9.5, meaning the margin of match victory was 3.

What will the Shanghai Tigers’ average CAPS accuracy be vs. the Croatia Bulldogs in Week 4? (On depth 20)
Over 85.5:  The average accuracy by the Shanghai Tigers was 90.5.

How many brilliant moves will Team MGD1 play vs the Norway Gnomes in Week 4 (on depth 20)?
Under 2.5: There were 2 brilliant moves played by Team MGD1, both were by Arjun Erigaisi.

How many underdog match victories (lower-rated team beats higher-rated team) will we have in Week 4?
Under 2.5: The only (1) underdog win was by the Norway Gnomes (2547 avg) over Team MGD1 (2591 avg).

How many King’s Indian Defenses (1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6) will we see in Week 4?
Under 2.5:  The only King’s Indian game this week was Lenderman - Swiercz.

How many games will start with 1.c4 in Week 4?
Over 10.5: 11 different games started with 1. c4.

How many games will contain a queenside castle in Week 4?
Under 15.5: Queenside castling happened in 8 different games.

How many games will last more than 40 moves in Week 4?
Over 47.5: 62 games lasted for at least 41 moves.

Pro Question: Which piece will move the most this week between the knights and the bishops? And how many moves?
Answer: Knights, with 1545 moves. Bishops had 1422 moves in total.

The winner of Week 4 was golbogdoomslay with 10/10 correct answers, who said Knights with 167 moves for the tiebreaker.

Results for Week 3 PCL Predictions:

What will be the smallest margin of victory this week?
Under 1.5: We had two games this week with a 1-point victory margin. Both Gnomes vs. Capybaras, and Chessbrahs vs. Garden State Passers ended with a 8.5-7.5 match score.

What will be the largest margin of victory this week?
Over 5.5: It was a week of blowouts where the Gotham Knights beat the Shanghai Tigers 9-3 and the Spanish Maniac Shrimps eliminated the Charlotte Cobras by winning 11-5.

How many games will the Canada Chessbrahs play 1.d4 in Week 3?
Under 6.5: The Chessbrahs only started two games with 1.d4 in Week 3.

How many games will the Gotham Knights play the Caro-Kann Defense (1.e4 c6) as black in Week 3?
Under 2.5: There were no games in the Caro-Kann from the Gotham Knights in Week 3.

How many games will start with a horsey move (1.Nf3, 1. Na3, 1. Nh3, 1.Nc3) from white in Week 3?
Over 2.5: 16 games started with 1.Nf3 this week.

How many games will Board 4 players win in Week 3?
Under 12.5: Board 4 players scored 12 wins in Week 3.

How many wins will animal-named teams score in Week 3?
Under 41.5: Animal-named teams scored 37 wins this week:

• Bears - 2 wins
• Bulldogs - 7 wins
• Capybaras - 6 wins
• Cobras - 3 wins
• Shrimps - 9 wins
• Tigers - 3 wins
• Unicorns - 7 wins

How many wins will the Spanish Maniac Shrimps score vs the Charlotte Cobras in Week 3?
Over 4.5: The Shrimps served us a proper blowout, scoring 9 wins in their 11.0 - 5.0 victory over the Cobras.

How many bishops will the Shanghai Tigers fianchetto in Week 3?
Under 5.5: The Shanghai Tigers fianchettoed 4 bishops in Week 3.

How many games will last more than 60 moves in Week 3?
Over 23.5: 26 games lasted 60 or more moves this week!

Pro Question: How many points will the black pieces score in Week 3?
Answer: Black scored 50 wins and 34 draws for a total of 67 points.

The winner of Week 3 was Ashtina249 with 10/10 correct picks and the prediction of 63 points scored for Black.

Results for Week 2 PCL Predictions:

What will be the smallest margin of victory this week?
Under 1.5: The Gotham Knights clinched a tight match 8.5 - 7.5 vs the California Unicorns.

What will be the largest margin of victory this week?
Over 5.5: The biggest margin of victory was 6.0 points as the Garden State Passers beat the Spanish Maniac Shrimps (11-5).

How many games will start with 1.b3 in Week 2?
Over 1.5: We had two games start with 1.b3: Magnus Carlsen played it versus Vidit Gujrathi, and Michael Bezold played 1.b3 versus Eline Roebers.

How many games with the Nimzo Indian Defense (1.d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Bb4) will there be in Week 2?
Over 2.5: Four games featured the Nimzo Indian Defense: Yu v. Aronyak, Sarana v. Pranav, Erigaisi v. Theodorou and Shankland v. Vokhidov.

How many games will Gotham Knights’ Board 1 win in Week 2?
Over 3.5: Hikaru (Board 1) won all his games in Week 2.

How many Brilliant moves will Blitz play in Week 2? (On Depth 20)
Under 2.5: Kateryna Lagno played two Brilliant moves in her game against Xu Yi, but these were the only Brilliant moves from Blitz this week.

How many decisive games will occur between the Norway Gnomes and Levitov Chess Wizards?
Over 11.5: 14/16 games were decisive between the Norway Gnomes and Levitov Chess Wizards.

How many wins will the Garden State Passers score in Week 2?
Over 5.5: The Garden State Passers scored 9 wins against the Spanish Maniac Shrimps.

How many queens will the Canada Chessbrahs sacrifice in Week 2?
Over 0.5: Razvan Preotu sacrificed his queen to win the game against Vidit Gujrathi in Round 2.

How many games will last less than 19.5 moves in Week 2?
Under 1.5: No games lasted less than 19.5 moves this week.

Pro Question: What will be the biggest upset in Week 2?
Answer: The biggest upset was the Tigers (2567) beating Blitz (2612) 10.5 to 5.5 = 5 points and 45 rating points. No one correctly predicted this result.

The winner of Week 2 was packingit with a perfect 10/10 correct picks!

Results for Week 1 PCL Predictions:

What will be the smallest margin of victory this week?
Under 1.5: Both “Norway Gnomes vs Spanish Maniac Shrimps” and “Blitz vs Team MGD1" went all the way to 10.5 - 9.5. A victory margin of 1.0.

What will be the largest margin of victory this week?
Under 5.5: The largest margin of victory was 5.0 points between Capybaras and Indian Yogis.

How many games will start with 1.e4?
Under 65.5 games: There were 54 games with 1.e4

How many Sicilian openings will we have?
Under 25.5: There were 12 games in the Sicilian.

How many games will Board 1 players win this week? (Board 1 = strongest player)
Over 24.5 games: Board 1 players won 33 games.

How many decisive games will occur this week?
Over 87.5: There were 94 decisive games.

How many decisive games will occur between Charlotte Cobras and Canada Chessbrahs?
Under 11.5:  There were 11 decisive games.

How many wins will Saint Louis Arch Bishops score this week?
Under 5.5 wins: Arch Bishops won 3 games.

How many ROOOOKs will Gotham Knights sac this week?
Over 1.5 rooks: There were 3 rook sacs from the Gotham Knights.

How many moves will the shortest game this week consist of?
Over 8.5 moves: The shortest game were 19 moves.

Pro Question:
The longest game in Week 1 was R4 between Buksa and Heinemann, lasting 92 moves.

The winner of Week 1 was ShaneSarosh with 9/10 correct picks and a guess of 89 moves as the longest game!