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Black and white piecesfly across a checkered landscape as the clock ticks ominously.His brain is racing and his heart is pumping. Each breath is quick and shallow as his eyes scan the board.

It's been more than three hours andWilliam Morrison is one game away from achievinginternationalchess master status.

A crowd of whispering spectators has gathered around him, watching his every move. It's rare to see an African American who has advanced to the upper echelons of the chess elite, especially ina sport traditionally dominated by Russians, Ukranians, Chineseand Israelis.

Morrison watches his opponent with a hawkish gaze and scrawls ona pad containing an ever-growing jumble of letters and numbers,arunning list of every move made in the game.

Another hour goes by, chess pieces shuffle, and Morrison pounds the clock one last time.

"Checkmate."

Morrison breathes a sigh of relief as he stands up and shakes his opponent's hand amid cheers. After nineexhausting games over the course of fivedays, Morrison beat all the expert-level players at the World Open in Philadelphia.

While Morrison grew up playing chess on the benches of New York City's Washington Square Park, his mother was born and raised in North Carolina.

For a while, she dated NFL Philadelphia Eagles playerRussel E. Murphy, who coached football in Asheboro, Burlington, and other parts of the Piedmont region for decades. Murphy was also known for being the strongest man in the world in his age and weight class.

Coach Murphy died of cancer in 2005, but his legacy of empowerment in the historically black East Asheboro community remains strong.

On a field dedicated to Coach Murphy, football players and cheerleaders host their practices over the summer. Children in East Asheboro also get coached for the SATs as part of Coach Murphy Camps, a nonprofit dedicated in his honor.

Now, thos students will get the chance to play chess with internationally ranked chess master William Morrison.

Read more:Murphy Football Camp: It was something special

Willie Gladden, a friend of Morrison's mother and organizer at Coach Murphy Camps, convinced Morrison to attend achess challenge spanning two days in June. The first one will be a qualifying event, where kids of all ages can play each otherand get some practice. It will take place Thursday at6 p.m. atthe Public Works Building in Asheboro. The top 20 contestants will end up playing Morrison at theChessMaster Event onFriday at 8 p.m. in the same location.

Morrison will play 20 separate games at once, going from board to board across the room as fast as he can.It may seem impossible to keep track of that many games, but for Morrison and many other top chess players, the moves on a chessboard are like second nature.

However, reaching that point took blood, sweat, and tears. Well, more like books, sweat, and tears.

When he was a kid, the hardest part about moving place to place was lugging his boxes of chess books. Hestudied everything he could get his hands on. Morrison recalls pawing through more than500books about chess over the course of his adolescence.

His regular vernacular includes phrases like Sicilian Defence, Fianchetto and Ruy Lopez. Chess players are historians of sorts, tracing the steps of other players from centuries ago. In the cardinal game that made Morrison a chess master, his opponent opened with theSicilian Defence, which was first scrawled onto a manuscript by an Italian chess player in 1594.

William's father taught him chess when he was only 6 years old, and Morrison was competing in tournaments by the time he finished elementary school. At the time, Morrison points out, chess wasn't a big part of black culture. Even today, there are only about50 black chess masters in the United States.

One of the reasons is pretty simple: Chess tournaments are expensive. Paying for flights, hotels, and fees for competitions can quickly add up, especially for a young chess player with limited means. Morrison had the opportunity to play in Canada and Europe, but he remembers the big financial burden of traveling. He tried to stay as local as possible and compete in as many competitions in New York as he could.

On his website,The Chess Drum, chess player and journalist Daaim Shabazz points out that people of African descent are often questioned for their intelligence. He once was asked by a Latin American whether Africans were intelligent enough to be grandmasters.

Shabazz suggests that more black mentors, black role models,and black tournament organizers could change the racial landscape of chess. He harks back to the legendary Black Bear School of Chess, a network of black chess players who gathered in Brooklyn for chess rumbles.

Despite Shabazz's concerns, Morrison is optimistic about a shift he observed in the chess world in the past few years.

Morrison noticed a huge push to teach chess in schools all over the country.In his hometown of New York City, a program calledChess in the Schoolshas taught half a million students in 48 schools.

Morrison, once known as "The Exterminator" to other chess players, now teaches children how to playchess in Baltimore. There are 65 schools in Baltimore that participate in chess programs, many of which arein the inner city and reaching minority populations, Morrison notes. The Baltimore Kids' Chess League boasts that 800 students from 40 Baltimore City Public Schools annually participate in their programs.

In Asheboro, there is an active chess group with approximately 450 followers on its Facebook page. Besides inspiring kids in East Asheboro, Morrison also hopes to scout some chess players who show potential.

There are only three black Grandmasters in chess, one from Brooklyn, another from Sweden, and another from Zambia. Perhaps Morrison might find the next one might in Asheboro.

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Michelle Shen is an Economic and Data Reporter for The Courier Tribune. Feel free to reach out to her with story tips on Twitter (michelle_shen10), Instagram (pretty_photos_by_michelle OR michelle_shen10), or email (mshen@gannett.com).

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An international chess champion is coming to Asheboro, and kids can play against him - Asheboro Courier Tribune