Tournament: Encyclopedia II - Tournament - Brackets and initial matchups

Tournament - Brackets and initial matchups

Often a "bracket" is physically drawn on a sheet of paper or whiteboard for the benefit of spectators and players, especially in single- and double-elimination tournaments, showing who is playing whom, and making it easy to see who will be matched up in future rounds depending on who wins each game.

The easiest way for a tournament organizer to match up participants in the first round of a tournament is to do so randomly. However, a more satisfactory tournament (for spectators) can often be created by initially matching the best (or "top seeded") several players against players who are not in the "best" rank, and placing these players in the bracket such that it is probable that the best four players will end up playing each other in the semifinals.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Brackets and initial matchups", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki