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Playoff Brackets

Walkthrough Video​

The following video will take you, the curling club or event manager, through the basics of creating playoff brackets for a league or competition.

Finding the Playoff Brackets​

To get to the stages screen and manage your playoff brackets, first click on the name of a league of competition.

Events List

You should then see a list of tabs near the top. Click on the Stages tab.

Stages Navigation

Playoff Brackets​

Our bracket builder makes it easy for you to setup elimination brackets / tournaments. Your events can mix round robins and brackets. E.g. Round robin league play ending in an elimination playoff bracket.

Click the New bracket button to create a playoff bracket.

Playoff Bracket Cheat Sheet Playoff Bracket Cheat Sheet

Groups​

  • You can have one or more groups in a bracket. Usually these would be named "Group 1", "Group 2", or "A Event", "B Event", etc.
  • Edit a group's name by clicking the pencil icon next to it.
  • Click the group's name to collapse or show it's grid of games.
  • Add new groups by clicking the "Add Group" button at the bottom of the screen.
  • Remove a group on it's edit screen if it's empty (has no games).
  • You can connect game results between brackets. For example, you could have a B event where teams that have lost play each other, and the winner of the B event could play the winner of the A event in a consolation game.

Games​

  • Add new games by double clicking on a blank area within a group.
  • Click the red ✘ in the top right corner of a game to remove that game.
  • Move games around by clicking the header of the game (where the game name is), holding down, and dragging the game to a new location. You can even drag games between groups.
  • Double click on a game to edit it and / or assign teams.
  • Click and drag a game's green "W" (winner) or red "L" (loser) circle icon to a game position (top of bottom slot) of another game to connect the potential winner or loser to their next game. For example you can click the green "W" of a semifinal game and drag it to the top slot of the final game.
  • The grid will automatically grow or shrink as you move games near it's edges.

Saving​

None of your changes are persisted until you click the "Save" button. So feel free to play around since you can cancel your changes at any time.

Open Source​

Our bracket builder is open source! More details can be found on the project's github page here: https://pairshaped.github.io/curlingio-bracket-builder/

How Winners and Losers Flow Through Brackets​

When you connect games using the winner (green "W") and loser (red "L") connections, you're setting up automatic advancement paths for your bracket.

Setting up connections:

  • Drag the green "W" from one game to a slot in another game - the winner will automatically go there
  • Drag the red "L" from one game to a slot in another game - the loser will automatically go there
  • You can connect winners and losers to different games (common in double-elimination or consolation brackets)
  • Connections can chain through multiple levels (quarterfinals → semifinals → finals)

When scores are entered: Once you've set up these connections and start entering scores on the Scores tab:

  • Winners and losers automatically populate their next games as soon as you save each result
  • You don't need to manually assign teams to downstream games
  • The bracket updates in real-time as games are completed
  • Multi-level cascading works automatically - if a semifinal winner advances to the final, that happens immediately

How team changes work:

  • Each game has two sides (top and bottom) that serve as the connection point between teams and their game results
  • When a team advances into a game, they're assigned to a side and inherit whatever is associated with that side
  • For first-round games (or any game without an incoming connection), you can manually assign or change teams at any time
  • For games that are fed by winner/loser connections, you cannot directly change the team - instead, change the team in the source game and the change will propagate forward automatically
  • If you change a score resulting in a different winner, the new winner/loser will propagate to downstream games, taking over the sides there
  • The only time teams cannot be automatically swapped is when shot-by-shot data has been recorded (used in about 1% of events), since that data is tied to specific curlers

Common bracket patterns:

  • Single elimination: Only use winner connections - losers are eliminated
  • Double elimination: Use loser connections to create a "B bracket" where losing teams get a second chance
  • Consolation games: Connect the losers from semifinals to a 3rd place game
  • A/B/C Events: Create multiple groups and connect losers from the A Event to the B Event, etc.

The key is to set up your connections before the event starts, then just enter scores and let the system handle team advancement.