Pool play brackets and schedules by team count

Pool play splits teams into small round robins and sends the best into a bracket. Pick your team count to see every split that works, and the bracket for the one with the fewest games.

The table shows the fewest games a split can take for each size.

When to use it

Pool play gives every team several games before the bracket starts, so nobody travels for one game. Teams are split into small pools by snake seeding, each pool plays a round robin, and the best teams go on to a bracket.

Pick a split by how many games each team should get: pools of four give three games and pools of five give four. The table shows the split with the fewest games in total.

Choose the split by the number of games you want each team to get. Pools of three are quick but give each team only two games. Pools of four or five give three or four games, which is closer to what travelling teams expect.

Each size page below shows every split that works, who plays whom in the first pools and how long the pool stage takes.

Questions