Running a Round Robin Cornhole Tournament with Scoreholio

I bet you’re used to double elimination cornhole tournaments where you’re a “loser” with one loss and out of the action with a second. It’s the most common format by far, but during several years running double elimination cornhole tournaments I became painfully familiar with a few huge drawbacks:

• 25% of all players are out after two games.
• Teams who lose play way more games than those who don’t in a losers’ bracket that takes forever.
• Those who win out have increasingly long waits between games in the winners’ bracket.

In every sports league but college football, teams play the same number of games in a regular season, and those who do well earn a seed in the playoffs. The same system works great for cornhole tournaments! Everybody plays lots of games and is rewarded for playing well, while folks who don’t do well had fun and honed their game without the disappointment of going “two and out.”

I think double elimination brackets became popular because running one used to be easier than round robin, but Scoreholio has made round robin easy peasy. Here’s how to set up and run a round robin tournament with a playoff using Scoreholio.

Note that events are WAY more fun if you display a dashboard and put scoreboards on each court. They’re not required, but once you see an event with them, you’ll never go back!

1. Click “Create New Tournament” in the Run a Tournament tab, selecting Round Robin and indicating how many games you want each team to play. (You’ll also indicate if you’re running singles, set teams or random teams, and things like how many courts you’ll play on.)
2. Check players in, ideally by scanning their QR code so they get alerts about court assignments, but manually if necessary. (If you’re doing set teams you’ll assign them to a team as part of checkin.)
3. Start round robin play by clicking “Start Tournament” in the Round Robin tab of the admin interface. (If you’re doing a blind draw you’ll first need to randomize teams first.)
4. Grab a beer and throw some bags! Scoreholio matches up teams until they’ve all played the same number of games, and alerts people when they’re up so you don’t have to chase people down. If you set up scoreboards at each court they’ll submit their own scores and Scoreholio will fire off the next game.
5. When round robin wraps up, start the playoffs by clicking Create Playoff Bracket in the Playoffs tab of the admin interface. Once you select single or double elimination and indicate how many teams you want to advance, Scoreholio will seed the bracket and get first round games going.

Congrats, you’re done! Scoreholio makes it so easy that many longtime tournament directors have told me it lets them enjoy playing in their own events for the first time in years. To learn more you can chat us up via our web site, read our FAQ or watch video tutorials, and join the Scoreholio Event Organizers group in Facebook.