Seattle area 40 & Over USTA League nearing completion - Local playoffs in just over 2 weeks!

It is only the first week of March, but in the Seattle area our 40 & Over league is nearly done with its regular season and local playoffs are in less than three weeks.  As such, some teams have wrapped up playoff spots while others are still being hotly contested.

For those following along, you may remember that last year our local playoffs had, for most levels, only each sub-flight winner and one second place team across all sub-flights advancing.  That gave teams pretty thin margins during the regular season as one bad match, perhaps with some of their best players missing, and their playoff chance could be gone.

The challenge last year was with the growth of USTA League in Seattle, the court demands to run local playoffs had grown to the point that it was difficult to get one or even two clubs to provide enough courts in one weekend for all the matches to be played.

Thankfully, this year we are back to the top-2 teams in each sub-flight advancing to local playoffs.  Our League Coordinator, Jill Borgida, came up with the idea of a "wildcard weekend" the week before local playoffs to get the first round of matches in reducing the burden for the actual local playoff weekend, and coordinated with clubs to get their support for those matches so all the matches can be played!  Thanks Jill!

The schedule does have quite a few different facilities being used so there isn't a central club or two where someone can camp out and watch all the matches, but I think the players are ok with that if it means more teams make playoffs and more players get to play.

Note, the new 18-39 co-ed league has also been run concurrently with the 40 & Over and its playoffs are also taking place at the same time, so that made securing courts a bit of a bigger task as well.

If you see Jill, be sure to thank her for her efforts on this, and please do thank the clubs for their part in making their facilities available.  Many of these are private clubs and they aren't obligated to do it, so let's make it all run smoothly so we can continue this model in the future.

As for the playoffs themselves, I will be doing reports to help teams scout opponents and plan their line-ups, and also look back at my simulations from the start of the year to see how well they predicted the teams to advance.

And with the 18 & Over league just about to start, it is never too early to start planning for that season and my flight reports, team reports, and simulations can be valuable tools for that.  And of course, I can do individual reports for any player at any time.

For those not in Seattle, all the reports I note above are available for players from any section or area and with your league getting ready for playoffs or perhaps just getting ready to start, I'd love to hear from you.

Contact me (ratings@teravation.net) if interested in any reports, or leave a comment here or on Facebook with your thoughts on the new playoff format for this year.