3rd Meijin title

Newcomers

The lowest three players from the previous year are demoted, and entrance matches determine which three new players enter the League.

game	date	black	white	result	#moves	sgf
Qualification final	1977-11-03	Ishii Kunio	Cho Chikun	W+0.5	247	sgf
Qualification final	1977-11-17	Yamabe Toshiro	Shiraishi Yutaka	W+1.5	265	sgf
Qualification final	1977-11-24	Sonoda Yuichi	Kudo Norio	W+3.5	248	sgf

League

Results (in the first column the white player, on the top row the black player). The ordering of the first six players is according to their results in the previous year. The last three are the winners of the entrance matches.

#	player	result	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9
1.	Otake Hideo	7-1			W+R		W+R		W+0.5		W+R
2.	Ishida Yoshio	3-5	B+2.5			B+2.5		B+3.5		W+R
3.	Sakata Eio	5-3		B+4.5			B+4.5		W+4.5		W+R
4.	Kato Masao	7-1	W+R		B+R			W+R		W+1.5
5.	Hashimoto Utaro	4-4		B+R		B+R			W+1.5		B+R
6.	Kajiwara Takeo	2-6	B+6.5		B+R		B+3.5			W+R
7.	Kudo Norio	3-5		W+6.5		B+R		W+15.5			B+9.5
8.	Shiraishi Yutaka	0-8	B+R		B+R		B+R		B+0.5
9.	Cho Chikun	5-3		W+2.5		B+2.5		W+R		W+3.5

Shiraishi Yutaka, Kajiwara Takeo, and Kudo Norio are demoted.

Playoff

Kato Masao and Otake Hideo both had 7 wins, and played a challenger playoff that was won by Otake Hideo.

game	date	black	white	result	sgf
Challenger playoff	1978-08-26	Kato Masao	Otake Hideo	W+3.5	sgf

3rd Meijin Title

date	black	white	result	#mv	sgf
1978-09-07,08	Rin Kaiho	Otake Hideo	B+R	193	sgf
1978-09-20,21	Otake Hideo	Rin Kaiho	B+2.5	263	sgf
1978-10-05,06	Rin Kaiho	Otake Hideo	W+R	180	sgf
1978-10-11,12	Otake Hideo	Rin Kaiho	B+R	159	sgf
1978-10-23,24	Rin Kaiho	Otake Hideo	B+R	131	sgf
1978-11-01,02	Otake Hideo	Rin Kaiho	B+R	205	sgf

Otake Hideo won 4-2.