Hello, Kids Academy! It’s Coach Rob here. Today, we’re going to learn about something cool in chess called stalemate. You might already know that in chess, you can win, lose, or even tie. A stalemate is a special kind of tie, and we’re going to find out how it works!
Let’s imagine we’re playing a game of chess. It’s White’s turn, and White decides to capture a pawn, thinking it’s a smart move. But wait! Let’s look at the chessboard. The Black king is on a square called h8 and is surrounded by other pieces. There’s a rook, a knight, and a queen nearby, and even White’s king is controlling some squares. The Black king is surrounded but safe because no one is attacking the square h8. This is where stalemate comes in!
A stalemate happens when a player’s king is safe, but that player has no moves left to make. It’s their turn, but they can’t move any of their pieces. In this case, the Black king can’t move, and the pawn is stuck. So, the game ends in a stalemate, which means it’s a tie. White had lots of extra pieces and could have won, but capturing that pawn led to a stalemate.
So, what could White have done instead? There were two moves that would have won the game. The first move is rook to g8. This is checkmate because the knight protects the rook, the rook attacks the king, and White’s king guards the escape squares. The second move is queen to f6, which also leads to checkmate. The queen attacks the king, the rook guards the g squares, and White’s king guards h7. There’s no escape for the Black king!
Now, let’s think about another move: rook to g7. What happens if White plays this move? Is the Black king in check, checkmate, stalemate, or nothing at all? It’s Black’s turn, and the king is safe. Rooks don’t move diagonally, so nothing is aiming at h8. The king can’t move, but there’s a pawn that can move. If the pawn moves, the game continues.
If Black moves the pawn two squares to f5 and it’s White’s turn, the knight might move, leading to another stalemate situation. The rook is protected, the king is safe in the corner, but now the pawn is stuck. Black has no moves, and it ends in a stalemate.
This happens a lot in chess games, especially when you’re learning. Here’s some advice: when you’re winning, don’t be too greedy. Don’t capture every piece you can. Focus on getting checkmate by attacking the king and the squares around it.
Also, when you’re winning, be careful about promoting too many pawns into queens. If you have too many queens and you’re not careful, you might end up in a stalemate. One or two queens are enough to checkmate the king. Remember, if the king is in check, it can’t be a stalemate.
Thanks for learning with me today! Keep practicing, and I’ll see you soon. Bye-bye!
Don’t forget to subscribe to our channel to stay updated on new videos. You can find links to our apps in the comments below!
**Welcome to Kids Academy!**
Hello, Kids Academy! It’s Coach Rob. Now that we know about check and checkmate, today we will talk about stalemate. Stalemate is another way a game of chess can end. We all know that you can win, you can lose, but you can also tie or draw in a game of chess. Today, we’re going to discuss one specific type of draw called stalemate.
Let’s go over to the chessboard and get right into it. In this game, it’s White’s turn, and White sees that this pawn is not defended, so White goes ahead and captures it, thinking it’s a very good move.
Let’s take a look at this position. The Black king is on h8 and is totally surrounded. This rook attacks the entire g-file, this knight is next to the king, and this queen is also next to the king. Even our king is controlling these squares. The Black king is totally surrounded, but the problem is that he is safe. No one is attacking the square h8, and here’s where stalemate comes into play.
Stalemate happens when a player’s king is safe, and that player doesn’t have any moves to make. So, it’s that player’s turn, the king is safe, and that player has no moves to make. This king is surrounded; he cannot move, and this pawn is stuck. Therefore, this game ends in a stalemate draw, which is very disappointing for White because White is up all these extra pieces. The king is surrounded, and it should be an easy win for White, but White got a little careless and captured this pawn, leaving Black with no moves to make and a safe king.
So, what should White have played instead? I see two checkmate moves for White. The first is rook to g8. Let’s take a moment to understand why this is checkmate. The knight protects the rook, the rook attacks the king, and the king is guarding the escape squares—checkmate!
White could also have played queen to f6 for checkmate. The queen attacks the king, the rook guards all the g squares, and the king guards h7. There’s no way out of that.
Now, let’s consider the move rook to g7, which we haven’t discussed yet. What happens if White plays rook to g7? Think about this question: Is the Black king in check, checkmate, stalemate, or nothing at all?
I’ll pause for a moment so you can think about the Black king. It’s Black’s turn. What happens in this game? The king is not in danger, so it cannot be check or checkmate. We know the king is safe because rooks don’t move diagonally, and nothing is aiming at square h8.
The real question is: Is this stalemate? The king is safe, but he cannot move. The king has no good squares to go to, and this pawn cannot move. However, this pawn can move. As long as the king is safe and Black hasn’t moved, even if the king doesn’t have a move, if a pawn, knight, bishop, rook, or queen can move, the game continues.
If Black pushes this pawn two squares to f5 and it’s White’s turn, maybe the knight moves here. Suddenly, we’re back in a stalemate situation. The rook is protected, the rook guards all these squares, the king is safe in the corner, but now this pawn is stuck. Black is without a move, and it ends in a draw in a stalemate.
This happens often in scholastic chess. My advice to you is that when you are ahead in a chess game, especially towards the end, don’t be overly greedy. Don’t capture every single opposing piece you can. Remember, the goal of the game is to get checkmate. You should be focusing on the king and trying to attack the king and the squares around him.
Another tip is that when you’re winning a chess game, don’t go overboard promoting your pawns into queens. If you have too many queens on the board and you’re not careful, you might end up in a stalemate position as well.
So, one queen, two queens—you can use them to checkmate the king that we learned about in a previous video. Force the king to the edge and make sure you’re checking the king because if the king is in check, it can never be stalemate.
Thanks for watching, and I’ll see you soon! Bye-bye!
Don’t forget to subscribe to our channel to stay updated on new videos. Find links to our apps in the comments below!
