Run a match play bracket

Quick answer. Once the bracket is built, your day has four jobs. Send everyone the link from 📊 Public bracket. Keep the bracket page open at the scoring table. Settle any match that ends level, or that will not be played, with Who advances?. When the final is settled, the page shows Champion. Send golfers to the bracket page, not to the event's public page, because the match board on the event page reads oddly.

This article is the day-of companion to Match play. That article builds the bracket and settles matches, and it is the place to go for those buttons. This one is about the day.

Who can do this: an Admin. This was walked as an Admin. Anyone with the link can read the public bracket.

Web only. This article covers the web pages. We did not check the phone app.

Before you start

Build the bracket, as in Match play. The bracket page should show a line such as "5 players · 8-player bracket · 3 rounds · seeded by handicap".

This walk used the gross version of match play, the one where nobody types a score. We did not walk net match play.

The steps

1. Find the public link. On the event page, in the box called Match Play Bracket, press 📊 Public bracket. You can also press Public bracket & print on the bracket page. A page called Match Play Bracket opens, with the event's name under it. The address ends in /public/bracket.
2. Send it out. Copy the address from your browser's address bar and send it to your golfers by email, text or the club's page. Nobody has to sign in. The page has no copy button.
3. Look at it before they do. The page shows the line "5 players · 8-player bracket · 3 rounds", then the matches by round, QUARTERFINALS, SEMIFINALS and the final. A golfer who skips the first round shows with the word Bye. A match that is waiting shows Not started. A round that is waiting for the one before shows "Waiting for the winners".
4. Keep the bracket page open at the scoring table. On the event page press ⚙ Bracket. It says "Winners move on as matches are scored, and this page updates on its own." Press Refresh if you want it this second. The public page says "Updates on its own as matches finish."
5. Settle matches as they finish. A match that ends level shows Choose who advances. A match that will not be played shows Decide without playing. Both open the Who advances? panel, which Match play goes through step by step. Type a short reason, such as "Won the chip-off". It shows on the bracket for everyone, including the public page.
6. Name the champion. When the final is settled, both the bracket page and the public page show Champion: and the winner's name. The line "Updates on its own as matches finish." goes away.
7. Print it if you want paper. On the public page, press Print bracket. The button appears only once a bracket has been built.

What you should see

Here is a practice event at Heron Bend Golf Club, a fictional club, with five golfers: Dave Prentiss, Steve Abernathy, Rick Delgado, Bob Hendricks and Susan Tillman. Seeded by handicap, the field made an 8-player bracket with three byes. Before we built anything, the public link said "No bracket has been built for this event yet." and had no Print bracket button.

We settled the matches without a score, as a director would for a chip-off or a withdrawal. Bob's first-round match against Susan was level, and the bracket said "Bob Hendricks advances — Won the chip-off". After the semifinals and the final were settled, both pages said Champion: Steve Abernathy, and the public page showed the same names and the same reasons as the admin page.

We also fetched the public page with no sign-in at all. It still showed the whole bracket, the champion and the reasons, with only a Sign In link in the header.

If it goes wrong

• The public link says "No bracket has been built for this event yet." The bracket has not been built, or you pressed Start over. Press ⚙ Bracket and build it.
• The bracket does not move after a match. On the bracket page press Refresh. On the public page, reload it. If it still does not move, the match may not be settled yet. A level match waits for you to press Choose who advances.
• The public link says "This event isn't available." We did not walk this one, the words are in the program. A Draft event is hidden from the public, and its bracket with it, except from the event's own organizer. See Your event's home base for the event's status.
• The event's public page shows a Match Play Board that looks wrong. It has a See the bracket link. On our practice event it showed labels such as "AS", "A 18 Up" and "B 18 Up" beside matches we had settled without a score. Under it, a table showed every golfer with 0 wins and 0 losses, and ties. We did not check a match that was played hole by hole. Send golfers the bracket page, not the event page.
• The event page has a panel called Match Play workflow (internal). It sits under the Match Play Bracket box, with buttons Preview Matches, Generate Matches and Refresh Matches. It calls itself an internal validation surface. We did not press its buttons. Use ⚙ Bracket instead.
• An Organizer cannot open the bracket page. Only an Admin can. Match play shows the message they see.
• A golfer cannot find their match. They need to open the event from their own account. Match play says more.
• I pressed Print bracket and nothing came out. We did not open the print preview, so we cannot say what your printer will do. The page is built to print on one Letter sheet, according to the program. Check your browser's print window.

Director's tip

Print the bracket the evening before and pin it where golfers wait. Match play is a social day, and golfers want to see who they play next and who is still in. Print a fresh one when the semifinals are set.

Related

• Match play
• Set up your event
• Your event's home base
• Picking the right format for your outing

Still stuck?

Email support@back9ops.com and tell us the event's name, the address of the page you are on, and what it says.