Create a League Part 3: Set up an Elimination/Playoff schedule on OpenSports (web guide)

Part III: Creating an Elimination schedule

This article is the third of a three-part tutorial on getting started with OpenSports leagues. It is assumed that you have already completed Part I and Part II and have set up a league and a round robin schedule, and that the season is at a point where you can use the standings table to automatically create an elimination bracket.

In the article, we’ll walk you step-by-step on how to set up a playoff/elimination bracket, otherwise known as a schedule of elimination round matches.

Let’s begin!

Creating an elimination/playoffs bracket

In this section, we’ll walk through how to set up an elimination bracket for your league.

A) Get started

To initiate the creation of an elimination schedule, navigate to the League Home page.
Under Manage Schedules, click on “Create Elimination Schedule”.

B) Schedule Details & Match Info

Schedule Details — You can give your schedule a title, like “League Cup” or “Playoffs”
Match Info — specify the duration for each match, any breaks between matches, and if there will be a 3rd place consolation match.

C) Team Selection

Select the teams to qualify in the elimination schedule.

D) Pool Setup

You can change the seed order by dragging and dropping the teams into the order you’d like.

E) Availabilities

Based on the number of teams, and match durations, the OpenSports system automatically calculates the total number of matches for the elimination round. In this step, you need to specify enough available time slots for all these matches so the OpenSports system can automatically assign each match to an available time at a facility.

There are two options: specifying available time slots manually or setting up a recurring schedule. For this tutorial, we’ll add a recurring series of time slots.

Tap the “Add” button and select “Recurring”
Specify Facility and Resource(s) — For example, Central Tech, Field 1. Note: You may need to create a new facility with resources if required. Facilities are created and shared for your entire group.
Specify the available time slots and recurrence schedule (e.g. Wednesdays, 2 weeks in a row).
You can create exclusions if you’d like to exclude specific dates (like holidays) from the schedule.
Preview the availabilities you’ve created.
Tap on “Create Availabilities for [X] Matches”.
Repeat steps 1–5 as necessary until you have created enough available time slots for all your matches.

F) Preview Bracket

Preview the bracket that will be created for this schedule before creating them. You can make changes to the seed in the “Pool Setup” which would automatically update this preview.

G) Preview Schedule

Preview the matches that will be created for this schedule before creating them. You can preview the schedule either through a calendar view, or a list view, and group the matches by location or by date.

H) Save Elimination Schedule (Unpublished)

Click Create Elimination schedule and voila! You will be brought to the list view of the matches.

From the Matches page, make sure you have the Elimination schedule selected so that you can view that schedule.
You can easily make edits here.

I) Edit matches (& make bulk edits)

Once the schedule is published, the admin can still make edits to specific matches, or to matches in bulk, and notifications will be automatically sent to players (e.g. if match times are changed) if you enable notifications for those specific changes.

To view the whole list of matches, simply click on Matches from the navigation bar.
On the Matches page, you’ll see the list of all matches sorted by date.
Click on the Edit button in the match row to replace, switch, or modify teams, or change the date/time/location/field for a specific match.
Click on multiple checkboxes to activate the Bulk Edit button and make the same changes to multiple matches at the same time.

To view additional match details such as the roster, click anywhere in the row for that match.
Click on the Edit button to the right of “Details”
You can view the players on each team’s roster, as well as if they have RSVP’d for the match, and you can check them in through this page .

If you click the Edit button from the Upcoming Match page, you can edit the facility/resource, start and end time, match notes and score notes.

J) Publish schedule

When you’re happy with your schedule of matches, navigate back to the league Home page, and tap “Publish” under Elimination Schedule.
Once the schedule is published, all registered players will receive a notification to check out their new match schedule!

K) Players’ view

Players will receive a notification that the schedule has been published.
From the match details page, players will be able to see which matches are cup/elimination/playoff games.

And you’re done!

Congratulations on making it to the end!

Don’t hesitate to reach our if you have any questions on how the OpenSports Leagues/Tournaments can be set up for your organization. Send them our way to contact@opensports.net