[Slynky]

Also, I certainly don't want to throw a wrench into all the hard work you've done and plans you have made so, as a suggestion for a future "Bash", I'd suggest Swiss System Chess pairing. The good thing about this sort of matching system is that it does the same (nearly) as your NCAA system does in that it seeds people similarly (if 16 people, then 1 plays 9, etc.). After that, all the people who won the round are then paired in order of rank, the list broken in half again with the top half playing the lower half till eventually, all the people who have the most round wins have to play each other. To get a clear tourney winner, 4 rounds (I think) will handle 16-20 people. 5 rounds for 40 people or so. Chess tournements rarely have 7 rounds since 6 rounds handles around 100. So, besides being similar to the bracket type pairing (you start off playing players weaker than you if you are in the top half), it doesn't have any dependancy on a set number of people. With Swiss System pairing, 17 could show up, 27, or 22 or whatever. If an odd number, there is a method for cmputing who gets the "bye".

Anyway, just something to consider for the future "Bashes" (then there wouldn't be any need to set it up for a certain number of people...whoever wanted to enter could enter).