First off, congrats to the Glass City Fightn' Thundercats, winners of the Season 33 edition of the LVIT, and to Rush Hour and the Spaniard Kings, who came in second and third, respectively. Yet again the tournament seemed to run smoothly, with the exception of a couple of teams that needed to be replaced for inactivity reasons.
Anyway, we'll be running it again next season in the Regional Minors leagues with similar qualifying criteria. Here's the relevant information:
It will be a 20 team tournament, with the following format:
Group Play - Days 1-16: 4 groups of 5 teams each will play round-robin format, one game between each team in the group, for a total of 4 games per team. Thus, each group plays a total of 10 games, and 40 games across all groups. Groupings will be determined at random, but depending on the makeup of the field, may be rigged so as to avoid intra-conference matchups.
Bracket Play - Days 17-32: The top 2 teams from each group will advance to the bracket portion of the tournament. Entries into the bracket, and seeding, will be determined first by record. The tiebreakers are, first, head to head, second (in the case of a 3-way tie), point differential, third, points allowed, fourth, points scored, and fifth, a coin flip.
Match Format:
All games must be ranked, and must NOT include home team abilities or salary-based morale bonuses. Group play games must NOT use playoff-style overtime rules, as ties are allowed. Bracket play games MUST use playoff-style overtime rules.
Automatic Qualification:
The following teams will automatically qualify for the Las Vegas Invitational provided they are (1) in the Regional Minors leagues in season 34; (2) do not gut so as to fail to field a competitive team; and (3) accept the invitation:
-All conference champions in the 5 University leagues (thus, a maximum of 10 teams).
-All teams in the top 10 of the University team rankings at the end of Day 40 of this season (if they did not already qualify via league play).
-Las Vegas White Tigers as tournament host (if they did not already qualify under the previous 2 criteria).**
So, in theory, if every team that won their conference remained operational and accepted the invitation, and no teams that won their conference ended in the top 10, and all of THOSE teams accepted the invitation, we wouldn't have any at-large spots (**and in that case, Las Vegas would not receive an automatic qualifying berth if they did not otherwise qualify).
But, that's pretty unlikely. So, any spots that are not filled by automatic qualifiers will be at-large. Teams that do not automatically qualify may sign up to be considered for an at-large bid, and bids will be granted based on merit, using any available and relevant information, including team strength and past performance. Just for reference, 9 of the 20 teams in the Season 32 edition and 8 of the 20 teams in the Season 33 edition were at-large teams, so it's definitely worth signing up to be considered.
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We have a private forum where team owners and anyone else they would like to have access will be invited. Here's the process, assuming my power doesn't get knocked out by another preposterously destructive storm:
END of Day 40: Automatic qualifiers decided. Owners of teams who have automatically qualified, either through rankings or through conference championships, will be PMed.
Day 41: Applications for at-large bids will be accepted beginning on this day.
Day -6: Deadline for both:
----Acceptances of automatic bids
----Applications for at-large bids
Day -5: At-large bids considered and team owners sent PMs. Several alternates will also be determined on this date in case a team later drops out. I will NOT be making any decisions prior to this date, so as to allow all teams sufficient time, if necessary, to recruit.
Day -4: Groups will be announced on this date.
Day 1: Earliest date teams are allowed to schedule a group game. Each team will play 4 games in their group.
Day 16: ALL GROUP GAMES must be played by this date. That is 4 games in 16 days, should be doable. Games do NOT need to be evenly spaced, you could even run them all on the same day as you want, so long as each team ends up playing each other team in its group once. Bracket will be announced on this date, though once your group standings are determined you'll know where your team will be on the bracket.
Day 17-22: Quarterfinals
Day 23-28: Semifinals
Day 29-32: Championship & 3rd Place Game
There will be some flexibility with the scheduling, but I consider it important to complete the championship prior to league playoffs.
Anyway, we'll be running it again next season in the Regional Minors leagues with similar qualifying criteria. Here's the relevant information:
It will be a 20 team tournament, with the following format:
Group Play - Days 1-16: 4 groups of 5 teams each will play round-robin format, one game between each team in the group, for a total of 4 games per team. Thus, each group plays a total of 10 games, and 40 games across all groups. Groupings will be determined at random, but depending on the makeup of the field, may be rigged so as to avoid intra-conference matchups.
Bracket Play - Days 17-32: The top 2 teams from each group will advance to the bracket portion of the tournament. Entries into the bracket, and seeding, will be determined first by record. The tiebreakers are, first, head to head, second (in the case of a 3-way tie), point differential, third, points allowed, fourth, points scored, and fifth, a coin flip.
Match Format:
All games must be ranked, and must NOT include home team abilities or salary-based morale bonuses. Group play games must NOT use playoff-style overtime rules, as ties are allowed. Bracket play games MUST use playoff-style overtime rules.
Automatic Qualification:
The following teams will automatically qualify for the Las Vegas Invitational provided they are (1) in the Regional Minors leagues in season 34; (2) do not gut so as to fail to field a competitive team; and (3) accept the invitation:
-All conference champions in the 5 University leagues (thus, a maximum of 10 teams).
-All teams in the top 10 of the University team rankings at the end of Day 40 of this season (if they did not already qualify via league play).
-Las Vegas White Tigers as tournament host (if they did not already qualify under the previous 2 criteria).**
So, in theory, if every team that won their conference remained operational and accepted the invitation, and no teams that won their conference ended in the top 10, and all of THOSE teams accepted the invitation, we wouldn't have any at-large spots (**and in that case, Las Vegas would not receive an automatic qualifying berth if they did not otherwise qualify).
But, that's pretty unlikely. So, any spots that are not filled by automatic qualifiers will be at-large. Teams that do not automatically qualify may sign up to be considered for an at-large bid, and bids will be granted based on merit, using any available and relevant information, including team strength and past performance. Just for reference, 9 of the 20 teams in the Season 32 edition and 8 of the 20 teams in the Season 33 edition were at-large teams, so it's definitely worth signing up to be considered.
-------------------------------------------------------
We have a private forum where team owners and anyone else they would like to have access will be invited. Here's the process, assuming my power doesn't get knocked out by another preposterously destructive storm:
END of Day 40: Automatic qualifiers decided. Owners of teams who have automatically qualified, either through rankings or through conference championships, will be PMed.
Day 41: Applications for at-large bids will be accepted beginning on this day.
Day -6: Deadline for both:
----Acceptances of automatic bids
----Applications for at-large bids
Day -5: At-large bids considered and team owners sent PMs. Several alternates will also be determined on this date in case a team later drops out. I will NOT be making any decisions prior to this date, so as to allow all teams sufficient time, if necessary, to recruit.
Day -4: Groups will be announced on this date.
Day 1: Earliest date teams are allowed to schedule a group game. Each team will play 4 games in their group.
Day 16: ALL GROUP GAMES must be played by this date. That is 4 games in 16 days, should be doable. Games do NOT need to be evenly spaced, you could even run them all on the same day as you want, so long as each team ends up playing each other team in its group once. Bracket will be announced on this date, though once your group standings are determined you'll know where your team will be on the bracket.
Day 17-22: Quarterfinals
Day 23-28: Semifinals
Day 29-32: Championship & 3rd Place Game
There will be some flexibility with the scheduling, but I consider it important to complete the championship prior to league playoffs.
