As of the March 2017 official ratings, 7-year old Aren Emrikian has given Illinois a top-in-age-group distinction for the first time since David Peng briefly held that honor. Aren's 1864 rating is 42 points higher than the number two seven-year old from Arizona. 

Ekansh Mehrotra is the number two Illinois 7-year old (ranked 41 in the US). Yuvraj Chennareddy is the number three Illinois 7-and-under -- and in fact is still only 6 years old!  He is the fifth highest-rated six-year old in the country.

Arthur Xu is number two in the country for nine-year olds. Arthur is 17 points shy from becoming a US Chess Expert -- with a higher rating than any Illinois 10 or 11 year old -- or 12 year old other than Aydin Turgut.

With Aren and Arthur, Illinois has six top-eight rated players across the youth age groups. (Dimitar Mardov & David Peng are #4, George Li #5, Aydin #8).

Illinois has 48 Top 100's this month -- compared to 19 for Wisconsin, 16 for Minnesota, 3 for Iowa, 4 for Indiana. In fact, WI, MN, IA and IN combined represent 21 million residents, 64 percent more than Illinois' 12.8 million population. Those four states combined have 42 Top 100's compared to the Land of Lincoln's 48.

Of our northernly surrounding states, only Wisconsin's Awonder Liang (#1 US 13 year old), Minnesota's Andrew Tang (formerly of Illinois -- #2 US 17 year old), Minnesota's Andrew Titus (#10 US 15 year old), and Iowa's Joseph Wan (#18 US 15 year old) are in the top 20 for their respective age group.

By comparison, Illinois hosts 11 players in the Top 20's at this time.

Illinois has three females among the gender-irrespective Top 100's: recent Illinois K-8 Champion Shreya Mangalam, Marissa Li and Miranda Liu, all US Chess Experts.

From the aforementioned states, Wisconsin sisters Divya & Ritika Pandey are top 100's as are siblings Susanna & Rachel Ulrich. Wisconsin's Anupama Rajendra is also a top 100 as are Minnesota's Alice Lee and Natassja Matus. Rachel, Anupama and Natassja are Experts.

Rank   Name Rating
       
Ages 7 & Under
1   Emrikian, Aren C (15766785) 1864
41   Mehrotra, Ekansh (15991103) 1214
86   Chennareddy, Yuvraj (15944053) -- Age 6 1025
       
Age 8
4   Mardov, Dimitar (15205818) 1910
12   Yong, David (15273720) 1707
58   Plotnick, Jacob (15823530) 1408
       
Age 9
2   Xu, Arthur (14968896) 1983
18   Zhao, Alex (15335115) 1802
26   Wang, William (15270976) 1714
84   Zhang, Owen (15459921) 1475
       
Age 10
100   Kaplan, Avi Harrison (15263943) 1590
       
Age 11
42   Zheng, Peter (15075977) 1858
44   Rao, Patrick (14855075) 1826
       
Age 12
8   Turgut, Aydin (14284734) 2203
64   Bareket, Adam (14949325) 1892
80   Gong, Brian Hope (14663750) 1847
       
Age 13
4   Peng, David Tianjian (14195454) 2370
22   Daniels, Jason Scott (14107163) 2099
26   Wang, Ricky (14403974) 2077
38   Mangalam, Shreya B (14385521) 2004
43   Zhang, Edward (14685367) 1990
55   Acharya, Siddharth (15165476) 1925
57   Jay, Neel (14803101) 1917
90   Carey, Aidan M (14949435) 1840
       
Age 14
48   Li, Marissa (14468490) 2030
57   Bareket, Tom (14949310) 2000
       
Age 15
11   Furfine, Jacob (13089315) 2295
23   Do, Vincent (13666696) 2198
30   Kalghatgi, Nikhil (13797221) 2167
36   Kalghatgi, Akhil (13797215) 2133
62   Hao, Hanson (13858968) 2052
71   Venkat, Abhyudhaya (14519152) 2025
78   Liu, Miranda (14042343) 2010
       
Age 16
17   Bian, Alex (13257335) 2314
36   Stevens, Matthew James (13788934) 2195
40   Bartochowski, Nicholas J (13216472) 2173
43   Bronfeyn, Daniel (13720325) 2162
50   Curcio, Jack Thomas (13451367) 2122
60   Narayanan, Rishi T (13949428) 2093
       
Age 17
5   Li, Zhaozhi (13646954) 2430
32   Adve, Anshul (13296020) 2194
62   Fei, Andrew Yueyang (14064411) 2026
67   Denby, Caleb Sean (14361200) 2019
96   Starkman, Eric Chandler (14556452) 1919
       
Age 18
16   Lehmann, Spencer (13457744) 2274
30   Hrach, Jonathan Matthew (14094872) 2204
78   Holecek, Zachary (12933315) 2014
90   Parker-Turner, Phillip (12954448) 1965