Third time’s the charm for Eric Yoder 6D. After two previous trips to the NAGF ProQual
semifinals, Yoder booked his first finals berth on Wednesday, edging 12-year-old Michael Xu 6D in a three-game thriller. He’ll face Guanyu Song 7D, who clinched his spot earlier in the day with a 2–0 sweep of Qiyou Wu 7D. Click here for bios of both players.
Yoder took Game 1 on Monday when Xu overlooked an endgame snapback. In Game 2, Yoder built a small but steady lead, only to slip under intense time pressure—playing the one move that let Xu’s dead group live and forcing a decider. Neither player seemed tired or daunted and the lead see-sawed back and forth all afternoon until finally it was Yoder who was slightly ahead after the last move had been played.
The finals are another best-of-three: Round 1 will be played at 9:30a Thursday, Round 2 at 7p Thursday night and Round 3 – if necessary – Friday morning at 9:30a. Observers are welcome to watch live at the National Go Center (4652 Wisconsin Ave NW, Washington, DC 20016). The EJ broadcast team will be livestreaming coverage on the AGA’s YouTube and Twitch channels, DangoStreams will also be covering Round 1 of the final, and Michael Redmond 9P, hosted by Chris Garlock, will provide commentary on the Round 2 game Thursday night.
Videos:
2025 NAGF ProQual Semi-Final: Round 2 (with recap by James Pinkerton 5D)
2025 NAGF ProQual Semi-Final: Round 3 Tie-Break Playoff (Commentary by Justin Teng 6D)
2025 NAGF Pro Qualifier (complete playlist)
Plus check out these other streamers who picked up the EJ livestream feed and did their own commentary!
NAGF Pro Qualifier Semi-final tie-breaker! (Round 3) PLUS new🕹️meta-game for chat !clairvoyance !aga
(features a new Twitch/OGS integration called “clairvoyance” that lets viewers click the Twitch screen and guess the next move; viewers who were most accurate win short rounds)
2025 Pro-Qualifiers Semi-Finals Round 2 (MidwestGoAssociation)
- report/photo by Chris Garlock