Another unflighted round-robin disaster in the making at SoCal 40 & Over Sectionals

Southern California will be holding their Sectionals for the 40 & Over division in a few weeks, and once again the unflighted round-robin format is being used in a way that could likely result in an undefeated team not advancing.

I've written numerous times on the subject of the risks and occurrences of undefeated teams being sent home, so I won't go through them all again, but suffice it is to say, it has happened and the chances are often pretty good it will happen for a given event.

National uses the format for Nationals, and with 17 teams and four matches per team, there is almost always a chance of it happening, but the chance is very low, often around 1% or less.  Still, even with that low a chance, you would expect it to happen every 75-100 events or so.

But what has been done by several sections is to use the format in an even riskier way, and that is what SoCal is doing.  The riskier use is to have more than 17 teams, and have them play only three matches.  When this is done it is even more likely you get "islands" of teams where many teams to play each other and they can all go 3-0.

As of my writing this, the teams/schedules could still change a bit perhaps, but:

• The 3.0 women have 14 teams playing three matches each.
• The 3.5 women have 17 teams, and the schedule isn't up yet but they'll likely play three matches each.
• The 4.0 women have 18 teams playing three matches each.

These are the risky flights, the others have fewer teams or have flights.

The 4.0 women is the worst, more teams than Nationals and fewer matches, a recipe for disaster.  If all the teams were equal, my simulation says there could be as many as seven (7!) undefeated teams and there is a 2% chance of five or more.

But the teams aren't equal, and in that case some teams are more likely to win, and my simulation says there is over a 6% chance of five or more being undefeated.  It isn't odds on to happen of course, but that is a reasonably high chance and once you'd think they would try to avoid.

This can be seen if we look at this diagram showing who plays against who.

For example, SDNC-Flynn, SD-Webster, CC-Braun, V-Schoenburg, V-Chao, SD-Dielman, and SDNC-Moses all don't play each other and could each finish 3-0.

The other two scenarios are not as bad.  The 3.0 women with 14 teams has a less than 1% chance of five or more undefeated.

We'll see what happens!

Who won at 2023 55 & Over Mixed Nationals? Warm weather sections dominate!

The 55 & over Mixed Nationals Invitational was held this weekend which means there are some new champions.

At the 6.0 level, four 4-0 teams made the semis in Texas, PNW, Northern, and NorCal, all four of these in the top-5 of my simulation, and Texas won it call beating Northern 2-1 in the final.

At the 7.0 level, there were five 4-0 teams and Eastern went home without making the semis.  Florida, Caribbean, Southern, and Midwest did make the semis, all four of these in the top-5 of my simulation, and Florida beat Southern 2-1 in the final.

At the 8.0 level, there were four 4-0 teams in SoCal, Florida, Middle States, and Southwest advancing, and again, all four teams were in the top-5 of my simulation.  This event had Southwest win 2-1 over Middle States.

Last, at the 9.0 level, with just nine teams, all four semi-finalists were at 3-1 or better, those being Southwest, MoValley, Florida, and NorCal.  Two of these teams were in the top-4 of the simulation.  Southwest won this one too beating Florida 2-1.

An interesting observation is that every champion was a warm weather section.  And 11 of 16 semi-finalists were from warm weather sections.

And it happened, a 4-0 team at Nationals does not make the semis and goes home early - 55 & Over Mixed 7.0

I wrote a little preview of the 55 & Over Mixed 7.0 Nationals Invitational taking place this weekend and in that preview I didn't discuss the chances of more than four undefeated teams occurring.  It was partly oversight, but also partly not wanting to say it might happen and then jinxing it by doing so and having it not happen.

Well, it happened.  Florida, Caribbean, Southern, Midwest, and Eastern all went 4-0 winning each of their matches.  The last three of those were all tied with 8-4 court records and Southern and Midwest both lost just 10 sets while Eastern lost 13 sets, so Eastern is left out and will miss out on the semis despite not losing a team match.

I've written about this numerous times before, that it could happen and the format really can't preclude it happening.  And it has happened at various playoffs, several Sectionals I know of it happened, but this may be the first time it has happened at a Nationals event.

In this case, Eastern likely was the weakest of the five teams, they only went 16-13 sets won/lost while all the other teams went 18-10 or better.  Still, it is tough to go to an event where the goal is to win team matches, win them all, and not advance.

And I haven't looked closely, but it is possible Eastern had a tougher schedule than the other teams and so their sets record may be more indicative of that than their not being as good as the other teams.

To be fair to the USTA, everyone knows (or should know) the situation going in to the event and know that this could happen and it may not be enough to just win the team matches.  It could come down to tie-breakers and winning convincingly may be required.  Let's hope Eastern knew this and it wasn't a surprise.

Good luck to the other teams in the semis tomorrow!

You _can_ go to Nationals without playing a match! Simulation and prediction for 55 & Over 7.0 Mixed

There is a USTA League Nationals event going on this weekend, the 55 & Over Mixed Invitational.  Perusing through the teams I noticed that the team from Northern got there without playing a match!

It appears the 7.0 team had no local league, and there was a Sectional invitational set up to determine the team to advance and they were the only team, so they got the invite to Nationals.

A team playing no matches makes it hard to have data to do my simulation from, but I did it anyway and the simulation predicts a pretty tight event.

No teams were expected to go undefeated, with just three teams projected to have a most likely record of 3-1, those being NorCal, Southern, and Caribbean.

That leaves a whopping 9 teams with a projected 2-2 record vying for the last semi-final spot.  The most likely to advance were Hawaii, Middle States, Florida, Texas, MO Valley, and Southwest.

After the first day, Southern is now projected to go 4-0.  They had a 27% chance before play started and now it is 55%.  But no others join them, instead there are six forecast to be 3-1.  Those being NorCal, Florida, Caribbean, Midwest, Eastern, and Southwest.

With just three courts played, there is a good chance there is a tie on courts for the last spot and then we get the dreaded tie-breakers.

We'll see what happens!

The 2023 USTA League Nationals schedule is out!

For many USTA League players, the dream of advancing to USTA League Nationals and winning the title is part of the allure of USTA League play.  Local league play takes place throughout the year, many areas having different leagues played year-round, but the main leagues have their Nationals in the Fall each year.

I just wrote about some of the secondary leagues and tournament nationals events, but the big news for those in the regular leagues is what the schedule is for those national events for 2023.

It looks like the sites for Nationals this year will be several of the traditional locations and include Orlando, San Diego, Surprise, and Tucson.  Oklahoma City was used last year as was Scottsdale and they are out with San Diego and Tucson in.

The schedule itself is very similar to last year with 18 & Over towards the front, 40 & Over in the middle, and 55 & Over and Mixed at the end.  Here is the full schedule:

• September 29 - October 1
• 18 & Over 2.5 women - Tucson, AZ
• 18 & Over 5.0 - Tucson, AZ
• 18 & Over 3.5 - Surprise, AZ
• October 6 - 8
• 18 & Over 4.5 - Surprise, AZ
• 40 & Over 3.5 - Tucson, AZ
• October 13 - 15
• 18 & Over 3.0 - Surprise, AZ
• 40 & Over 4.5 - Tucson, AZ
• October 20 - 22
• 18 & Over 4.0 - Surprise, AZ
• 40 & Over 3.0 - San Diego, CA
• 55 & Over 6.0 / 8.0 - Orlando, FL
• October 27 - 29
• 40 & Over 4.0 - San Diego, CA
• 55 & Over 7.0 / 9.0 - Orlando, FL
• 18 & Over Mixed 6.0 / 8.0 / 10.0 - Surprise, AZ
• November 3 - 5
• 40 & Over Mixed 7.0 / 9.0 - Surprise, AZ
• November 10 - 12
• 18 & Over Mixed 7.0 / 9.0 - Orlando, FL
• 40 & over Mixed 6.0 / 8.0 - San Diego, CA

If you aspire to make it to Nationals, pencil those dates in on your schedule!

USTA Nationals aren't only in the Fall!

Those that play USTA League are used to the league season culminating in Nationials being held in October and November, but that isn't the only time national events are held.

What is played in the Fall are the "main" leagues, those being 18 & Over Adult and Mixed, 40 & Over Adult and Mixed, and 55 & Over Adult.  But there are other leagues played and some of them end up having their national events in the Spring.

Now, these events are not called "Nationals" for some reason but instead are "National Invitationals".  Here are a few:

• January 27 - 29, February 3 - 5, February 17-19: 65 & Over National Invitational in Surprise, AZ
• March 17 - 19: Tom Fey Tri-Level National Invitational in San Diego, CA
• April 21 - 23: 55 & Over Mixed National Invitational in Scottsdale, AZ

The last of these is next weekend, good luck to all those attending.

Additionally, the national events for NTRP tournament players are in the Spring.  This gives tournament players from across the country that excelled in tournament play an opportunity to qualify from their section and test themselves against those from other sections.

Here is/was the NTRP tournament Nationals schedule:

• March 31 - April 2 
• 18 & Over Singles in San Diego, CA
• 40 & Over Singles in Orlando, FL
• 55 & Over Singles in Surprise, AZ
• April 14 - 16
• 18 & Over Doubles in San Diego, CA
• 40 & Over Doubles in Pelham, AL
• 55 & Over Doubles in Surprise, AZ

The last of these is this weekend, good luck to all those participating as I write this!