6 team bracket
Six entrants make 3 rounds and 5 matches in an 8-slot draw, with two byes. Type your names over the sample ones and print.
The bracket
Quarter-finals
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AshfordBye
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DunmoreEastfield
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FernhillCastleton
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ByeBellweather
Semi-finals
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Ashford
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Bellweather
Final
Winner
What a 6-team draw looks like
6 entrants need a 8-slot bracket, because a knockout draw halves the field each round and only a power of two halves cleanly all the way down. That gives 3 rounds: quarter-finals, semi-finals and final.
Two slots are empty, so two of the 6 entrants skip round one and join at the semi-finals. They go to the top two seeds, because a bye is one fewer match to win and that advantage belongs to whoever earned the seeding.
The match count is fixed at 5 whatever the byes do, because every match eliminates exactly one entrant and all but the winner must be eliminated. That identity is the quickest way to check any bracket, printed or drawn: count the boxes, and if it is not 5 something is wrong with it.
Running a 6-entrant tournament
Five matches is one session. At fifteen minutes a match on a single court or table it is under two hours including the gaps, which is why this size is the default for an evening.
Seeding 6 entrants means seed 1 meets a bye first and cannot meet seed 2 before the final. The slot order for 8 slots runs 1, 8, 4, 5, 6, 3, 7, 2, generated from the size rather than copied from a table — which is what makes it right here and not only for sixteen.
If nobody has a ranking, draw it at random instead. A guessed seeding is worse than none: it puts an error into the draw systematically, and with 6 entrants that error decides the tournament more often than the guess was ever worth.
Printing a 6-team sheet
8 slots — 6 entrants and 2 byes — fits one A4 sheet in landscape at a size somebody can write in.
The print stylesheet removes the header, the navigation, the advertisement and the URL, so 4 first-round boxes and everything after them are all that reaches the paper. Names print into the boxes if you have supplied them and come out empty if you have not, which is how one page gives you both a filled 6-entrant draw and a blank sheet to fill in at the table.
Print a spare. A 6-entrant draw takes one name written in the wrong box to become a sheet somebody has to redo, and it happens at most draws.
Common questions
How many matches in a 6 team tournament?
Five — always one fewer than the field. Every match eliminates one entrant and all but the winner must be eliminated, so byes do not change the total.
How many rounds does a 6 team bracket have?
Three: quarter-finals, semi-finals and final. 6 entrants fill a 8-slot draw, and 8 halves three times before it reaches one.
How many byes in a 6 team bracket?
Two, because 6 entrants have to fill a 8-slot draw. They go to the top two seeds, who join at the semi-finals.