A Brief Time-Out

 

NN - perrypawnpusher

The above position from a recent 5-minute game of mine at FICS is one of those Good News / Bad News things that reflects the interesting nature of chess.

The Good News: I had the Black pieces, and checkmate of White is inescapable. Resignation by my opponent would be understandable.

The Bad News: However, at this point in the game I ran out of time. So - Black won on time?

Actually, not. 

A look at the FIDE competition rules (the United States Chess Federation and FICS website rules are similar) - Article 6: The chessclock - shows 

6.9 [I]f a player does not complete the prescribed number of moves in the allotted time, the game is lost by that player. However, the game is drawn if the position is such that the opponent cannot checkmate the player’s king by any possible series of legal moves. 

Since White has a lone King, he does not have sufficient material to deliver checkmate. Therefore, the game was drawn.