MCBA
Tournament Planning Information
Every team participates in our
post-season tournament.
Here are rough sketches of various MCBA double
elimination tournament brackets.
Four-team
league/division
Five-team
league/division
Six-team
league/division
Seven-team
league/division
Eight-team
league/division
Nine-team
league/division
Ten-team
league/division
Eleven-team
league/division
Twelve-team
league/division
Thirteen-team
league/division
Each tournament is the balanced format, adopted
by MCBA in 2000 for the 2001 season, which places teams into the bracket in
such a way as to avoid obvious mismatches in the early rounds. The traditional “best-worst” format, which
pits the best team against the worst team (and so on) in an obviously hopeless
game, was abandoned by MCBA. It’s still
double elimination but even strong teams must “compete” starting with their
first game.
We do not schedule “what if” games on the last
day. If a team advances to the
championship game undefeated, then loses that game, it finishes in second
place. We floated an idea for “what if”
games before the 2003 tournament: No
interest from coaches or Association officers.
Note that, once a league grows to 9-10 or more
teams, it’s possible for a child to play nearly every night of the week,
something we want to avoid. Therefore,
MCBA splits leagues of 9 or more teams into two divisions, based on season
record, with the stronger teams in one division (we call this the “gold”
conference) and the weaker teams in the other (we call this the “silver”
conference). They play for separate
championships and separate awards (see the Awards
Policy). This shortens their
tournaments (out far fewer school nights, especially significant since some
years this is the week of TAKS testing), promotes healthy competition,
and avoids gross mismatches.
In addition, for Rookie Leagues (1st and
2nd grades) we change the tournament format to consolation.
Five-team
league/division
Six-team
league/division
Seven-team
league/division
Eight-team
league/division
Nine-team
league/division
Ten-team
league/division
Every team gets at least two games. First round losers play for a “consolation
championship.” We do this to avoid
playing our youngest children on too many school nights and to reduce the
“intensity” associated with post season tournaments. Note that, in the Rookie Leagues, the Awards Policy does not offer tournament trophies,
simply “our congratulations on a job well done.”
When the overall size of the MCBA tournament is such
that it’s impossible to squeeze into available gym space Monday thru Saturday
(all five junior high schools, with two gyms each, and maybe a high school),
then we play many first-round games on the first Sunday following the regular
season, starting around 1:30pm. This has
been the case every year this century.
In fact, every league can anticipate starting on Sunday. The highest seeded team(s) may “bye”
until Monday or Tuesday night.
We’ve found that the best format for our tournament
is to play two games per gym on weekday nights (roughly at 6:30 and 7:45). Three games per gym (say at 6:00, 7:00 and
8:00) is not nearly as enjoyable or satisfactory. On Saturday, usually, we have the semi-final
(third place) games in the morning with the winners advancing to the championship
games in the afternoon or evening. We
schedule league awards ceremonies following their championship game.
We allow for an hour and 15 minutes per game during
the tournament, not one hour as we do in the regular season, so that players
have some warm-up time and can be introduced prior to their games. Early-round Rookie League games rarely last
more than an hour, so they are scheduled hourly.
Our overall schedule, from start to finish, is based
upon the H-E-B ISD school calendar. We
hold our tournament so that it ends a week before Spring Break.
We also take into consideration statewide testing
(TAKS) and avoid games the night before a test for the affected grades.
Historically, we had an admission charge for everyone
except players in uniform, registered coaches and association
officers. We did this to defray costs to
families rather than charge higher registration fees. Past seasons’ admission: Adult’s all-tournament pass, $5; Adult’s
single-date ticket, $3; Student’s (grades 1-12) all-tournament pass, $3;
Student’s single-date ticket, $1; Children 5 and under free. However, beginning in 2004 we raised
registration fees and waived admission charges for tournaments.
