Women's Professional Soccer Playoff Picture
Scenarios, Tiebreakers, and Strange Playoff Format
Jul 8, 2009
The inaugural Women's Professional Soccer League Playoffs are about month away, and the Los Angeles Sol have all but locked up the regular season title. The WPS website has announced its playoff system for this year as well as the scenarios for tiebreakers at the end of the regular season.
Women's Professional Soccer League Standings (as of July 8, 2009)
Only four teams will make the playoffs, and at the moment the Sol have the regular season title in hand with a 14-point lead in the standings. The Sol and Saint Louis Athletica square off on July 8. Athletica and the Boston Breakers have a slight chance of catching the Sol in the remaining five weeks of the season.
Los Angeles Sol: 11-2-4, 37 pts.
Saint Louis Athletica: 7-5-2, 23 pts.
Boston Breakers: 5-5-3, 18 pts.
Washington Freedom: 4-6-4, 16 pts.
Sky Blue FC: 4-6-3, 15 pts.
Chicago Red Stars: 6-3-5, 14 pts.
FC Gold Pride: 3-7-3, 12 pts.
Tiebreakers
The possibility of Athletica or the Breakers catching the Sol is low. All that Los Angeles has to do is win one of its remaining three games and they will clinch the inaugural WPS Regular Season Title. They had an opportunity to do it on July 8, but suffered their only home loss of the season, falling 1-0 to Athletica. The Breakers or Athletica would need to win all of their remaining games and Los Angeles would need to lose their final three games for the Sol not to clinch the regular season title. Only four teams will reach the playoffs in 2009. If there are ties between teams at the end of the regular season, there are two scenarios for tiebreakers to determine who reaches the playoffs.
Two-way Tie:
1) Head-to-Head record
2) Head-to-Head goal differential
3) Overall goal differential
4) Overall goals scored
5) Away points
6) Away goal differential
7) Away goals scored
8) Coin flip
Three or more teams tied:
1) Head-to-head. There are many possibilities here, however. The first level is head-to-head in points-per-game against the other teams. If this results in a tie, then the next level is goal differential in head-to-head competition. If there is an imbalanced head-to-head schedule, then the tiebreaking moves to the second tiebreaker.
2) Overall goal differential
3) Overall goals scored
4) Away points
5) Away goal differential
6) Away goals scored
7) Coin flip
Playoff Picture
The single-elimination playoff format for the WPS is certainly an interesting one. Only four teams will reach the playoffs, and each is rewarded for their efforts in the regular season individually.
The playoffs begin on August 15, with the third seed hosting the fourth seed in the first round. The winner of the first round match-up will travel to the second-seeded team on August 18 or 19 for the Super Semifinal. After that, the unusual part of the playoff format kicks in. Whichever team wins the WPS Regular Season Title will get an automatic bid in the WPS Championship. Not only does this team skip the rest of the playoffs completely, there is no neutral site for the Final; the Regular Season Champion will host the league championship on August 22. Can't get much better for that team. Essentially Los Angeles has to win one of their remaining games, and they are automatically in the Championship.
According to the WPS website, the league wanted to reward teams for their regular season performance, staying "true to soccer's European roots." Basically, the WPS Champion will have either won the Regular Season Title and received an automatic home Championship bid, or would have to overcome the odds of playing through the rest of the tournament.
