Possible That Opponent Cheated (chess.com)

Hello all,

I recently played a game in a tournament on chess.com. The tournament was hosted by my local chess club. I am a little suspicious that my opponent cheated as he was rated 1000 USCF, and played many hard-to-find moves in a few minutes, and had an overall chess.com accuracy of 99.2. That's really high, and absurd for someone my opponent's rating. I have already reviewed the game and analyzed my mistakes. I would like it if someone strong could give feedback on if they think my opponent was legit or not. Thank you in advance!

I did not post this on chess.com as I am not sure if this is true or not, and do not want my opponent to know before there is a verdict because it could be potentially insulting.

As I do not know how to embed a playable chess board here, I will post the game notation.

1. e4 e6 2. Nf3 d5 3. e5 c5 4. b4 cxb4 5. d4 Nc6 6. a3 Bd7 7. axb4 Bxb4+ 8. c3
Ba5 9. Bd3 Nge7 10. O-O h6 11. Qc2 O-O 12. Ba3 Rc8 13. Qe2 Bb6 14. Bc2 f5 15.
exf6 Rxf6 16. Qd3 Ng6 17. g3 e5 18. dxe5 Bf5 19. Qe2 Ncxe5 20. Nxe5 Bxc2 21. Ng4
Bf5 22. Nxf6+ Qxf6 23. Bb4 Ne5 24. Re1 Bg4 25. Qf1 Nf3+ 26. Kh1 Nxe1 27. Nd2 Nc2
28. Rb1 Nxb4 29. Rxb4 Qxf2 30. Qxf2 Bxf2 31. Rxg4 Rxc3 32. Nf1 Bc5 33. Kg2 Rc4
34. Rxc4 dxc4 35. Kf3 c3 36. Ke2 b5 37. Kd3 b4 38. Kc2 a5 39. g4 a4 40. h3 Bd4
41. Ng3 b3+ 42. Kb1 c2+ 43. Kc1 Be3+ 44. Kb2 c1=Q# 0-1

Suspicious moves:

Move 14: 3 minutes (?!)
Move 16: 1 minute (?????)
Move 18: 4 minutes (!?)

Not-so-suspicious moves but also really weird that opponent played them:

Move 10: The point of this is to prevent a Greek Gift, but how a legit 1000 could identify the motif is bewildering.
Everything after Move 31: 13 minutes to play the entire thing perfectly

its a cheat. i usually dont play that strong and im 1400 uscf

Ya, I think he was a cheater... Just look how many computer best moves he played--- only 1 inaccuracy!!!

If your opponent really is 1000 rated, the game is probably suspicious, because of how accurately he/she played. However, any player can have a good day and with a lot of time to think, even beginners can play surprisingly well. What is your opponent's online rating?

As a 2000 rated player, I don't see any particular moves that raise major red flags. After 17. g3, which exposed major light squared weaknesses, black won by finding Bg4 and Nf3+ which are pretty straightforward moves. Then after a series of trades, black had an overwhelming queenside pawn majority, which is easy to win with. g3 and Re1 were the moves that made the difference in the game.

That being said, overall, the accuracy during the game as a whole is quite unusual, so you could report the game, and let chess.com decide whether your opponent was likely using an engine.

As a side note, it is discouraged to use these forums to share potentially suspicious games.

I could play this well in 3|0.