Kusunoki Teruko
Nihon Ki-in photo
(楠光子, b. 3 September 1939) is a retired Nihon Ki-in female professional. Qualified in 1956, 7 dan in 1984 (nee Honda Teruko 本田輝子). Retired on 31 March 2019 aged 79, and thus promoted to 8 dan, level with her much older sister Sugiuchi Kazuko. Before that, she had a semi-retirement where she played no professional games between 2 Dec 2007 and 18 Feb 2016. Her total number of wins fell just short of 500: 497.
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Name
Her maiden name Honda 本田 (pronounced Běntián in Chinese) means “Origin of the (rice) field. Her given name Teruko 輝子 (which could also be read Akiko in Japanese, and Huīzǐ in Chinese) means “shining/radiant child”.
Her married name Kusunoki (楠) means camphor tree. In Chinese, it would be pronounced Nán, meaning nanmu tree (Phoebe zhennan)), a type of evergreen tree native to China.
Three Honda sisters
Kusunoki Teruko is the youngest of the three professional go-playing Honda sisters, all of whom have won the strongest women’s tournaments. Her older sisters are the late Honda Sachiko, 9 years older, and Sugiuchi Kazuko, 12 years older who is still winning official professional Go games aged 96 (as of 2023). They have won 24 titles between them.
The oldest, Kazuko, was a student of Kita Fumiko, while Sachiko and Teruko studied under Kitani Minoru.
Achievements
She won the the Women's Kakusei in 1979, 1984, and 1985, and the Women's Honinbo in 1983, 1985, 1987, 1988, and 1989. She achieved 400 career wins in 1999. She has won a total of 7 titles, 10th= place (with her older sister Honda Sachiko) in the number of Japanese women's titles.
She also had some successes in mixed tournaments. E.g. in 1983, she reached the main ![[ext]](images/extlink.gif)
Goseil tournament ([9th Gosei, losing in first round to Kurosawa Tadanao. In 1989, she was the first woman to reach the final 8 of the Shinjin O tournament (14th Shinjin O | https://homepages.cwi.nl/~aeb/go/games/games/Shinjin-O/14/index.html]). On the way she beat Obuchi Morito and Yokota Shigeaki, but was eliminated by Izumitani Hideo.
She taught go overseas: United States in 1961 (accompanied by her sister Honda Sachiko and Kitani Reiko), staying for two months as Go ambassador. She also taught in Taiwan in 1966.
On the World Women's Rating List of 1986-01-01, Kusunoki was the #1 Japanese woman and #6 ranked woman in the world.
Head-to-head scores against other leading female players
(Based on Kusunoki Teruko, Go rating profile and game list, which starts in 1975, when Kusunoki was already 36)
- Sugiuchi Kazuko, 8p, her oldest sister, 4× All-Japan Women's Championship, 4× Women's Meijin, 2× Women's Kakusei: 2–2
- Honda Sachiko, 7p, her older sister, 2× Female Honinbo, 5× All-Japan Women's Championship: 5–5
- Ito Tomoe, 7p, 7× All-Japan Women's Championship, once Women's Kakusei: 3–2
- Shiratori Sumiko, 6p, longest lived professional player in history: 1–0
- Suzuki Tsuna, 5p, once Women's Kakusei: 1–1
- Kobayashi Reiko, 7p, 6× All-Japan Women's Championship, 2× (Old) Women's Meijin: 4–3
- Ogawa Tomoko, 7p, once Female Honinbo, 2× All-Japan Women's Championship: 11–3
- Kobayashi Chizu, 6p, 3× Women's Kakusei and All-Japan Women's Championship: 5–1
- Shinkai Hiroko, 5p, 2× Female Strongest: 1–1
- Aoki Kikuyo, 8p, once Female Kisei, 5× Women's Meijin, 4× Women's Kakusei: 0–4
- Kato Tomoko, 6p, her pupil and once winner of Women's Honinbo, Women's Meijin, Women's Kakusei, and Female Strongest: 0–1
- Koyama Terumi, 6p, née Nishida, 4× Women's Meijin: 0–1
- Okada Yumiko, 6p, née Abe, once Female Strongest: 2–1
- Yoshida Mika, 8p, 5× Women's Meijin, 4× Women's Kakusei, once Female Kisei and Female Strongest: 0–2
- Nakazawa Ayako, 5p, 2× Women's Honinbo, 2× Women's Kakusei: 1–2
- Kobayashi Izumi, 7p, Kobayashi Reiko's daughter, 2× Female Kisei, 3× Women's Meijin, 3× Female Honinbo: 0–3
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