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GuidesCreate a Tournament

Create a Tournament

This guide walks through creating a tournament, selecting a bracket size, and configuring settings in the Admin dashboard.

1. Create the Tournament

  1. Log in to dash.staty.io 
  2. In the sidebar, open Competitions (under League Management)
  3. In the Tournaments section, click “Add Tournament”
  4. In the create dialog, type the name (e.g. “Summer Cup 2026”) and review the contests (e.g. Mens / Womens / Co-ed) and divisions pre-filled from your sport’s template; rename, add, or remove them freely
  5. Leave Include registration checked to open signup in the same step: Basic Registration keeps sensible defaults, Custom Registration takes you straight to the registration’s edit page, and the “Open registration immediately” toggle controls whether signup goes live right away
  6. Click Create

The tournament appears in the Competitions tree with its contests and divisions; expand it to add more inline later. Double-click a name to rename it, and open the row’s ⋯ menu for Settings, Payment, Admins, and more.

The old separate Tournaments and Leagues tabs have been removed from the admin sidebar; Competitions is the one place to create and manage tournaments, leagues, and divisions. A tournament or league row’s ⋯ → Settings drawer includes its Start Date (the create dialog has no date fields).

2. Choose a Division Format

From a division’s row in Competitions, open the division page (the arrow icon) and pick a Division Format:

  • Round Robin / Round Robin with Playoffs: every team plays every other team; the playoff variant appends a bracket for the top seeds
  • Pool Play / Pool Play with Playoffs: teams split into pools, with the playoff variant advancing pool finishers to a bracket
  • Bracket: single-elimination playoffs where you lose once and you’re out
  • Bracket with Consolation: single-elimination plus a consolation bracket so every team ends with a final placement: quarterfinal losers drop into consolation semifinals, whose winners meet in a 5th Place game and losers in a 7th Place game, while semifinal losers play the 3rd Place game

3. Select a Bracket Size

For the bracket formats, choose the playoff bracket size: 2, 4, or 8 teams (stored as config.playoffTeams on the division; the consolation format supports 4 and 8, since a 2-team bracket has no consolation).

  1. Seed your teams with Sort by Seed on the division page
  2. Click Auto-Populate Games: first-round games are created from the seeds (1v8, 4v5, 3v6, 2v7 for an 8-team bracket) and later rounds are created with “Winner of …” / “Loser of …” placeholders
  3. As scores are entered, winners (and losers, for consolation) advance automatically into the next bracket game; correcting a score re-points the affected games

You can generate the bracket before any teams have registered: seed positions without a team appear as “Seed 1”, “Seed 2”, … placeholders on the public schedule. Once teams are in and seeded, re-run Auto-Populate Games; it replaces the generated games (a confirmation warns you first) with first-round games seeded from the real teams.

As soon as a bracket format and bracket size are chosen, the public site’s Standings tab shows a visual playoff bracket, even before any games exist, with placeholder slots (“Seed 1”, “Winner of Quarterfinal 1”). Once games are generated it displays each game’s teams, scores, date, time, and court, with winners advancing through the bracket as results are entered. Consolation formats get a second bracket section for the quarterfinal losers.

For the Round Robin with Playoffs and Pool Play with Playoffs formats, the group-stage games and the playoff bracket are generated separately: Auto-Populate Games creates the round-robin/pool games, and Generate Playoff Bracket creates a placeholder game for every playoff slot (“Seed 1”, “Winner of Semifinal 1”, …). Assign the first-round teams from the standings once the group stage is decided; later rounds then advance automatically as scores come in. Re-running one generator never touches the other’s games.

You can run multiple tournaments under one organization. Each tournament manages its own bracket, registration, and results independently.

Can I clone a previous tournament’s configuration?

Yes. In the Competitions tab, open the tournament’s ⋯ menu and choose Clone. Name the copy and choose Clone Sections & Divisions to bring the contest/division structure along; if the tournament has a registration, you can also Clone Registration; the copied registration starts inactive so you can review its dates, fields, and waivers before opening it. Cloning copies configuration (not teams, games, or scores), so the new tournament starts fresh.

How do I view a list of past tournaments?

The Competitions tab lists all your tournaments (expand each to see its contests and divisions). Tournaments have an Active switch you toggle to archive or unarchive them; active means “not archived,” not “currently in season,” so a long list of active tournaments is normal. Use the switch to keep older tournaments out of the way.

4. Configure via API

You can also create tournaments programmatically:

# Create a tournament
curl -X POST https://api.staty.io/api/v1/tournaments \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer sk_live_..." \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "name": "Summer Cup 2026",
    "contestType": "open",
    "sports": ["soccer"],
    "startDate": "2026-07-01"
  }'

Next Steps

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