Two teams (George Fox and UMass Boston) tied for the DIII track title last weekend - what's the best way to break a tie?

Luv2Run wrote:

IIRC the tie break rule in NCAA XC is pretty bad.

I see nothing wrong with a tie in this case since there is not a great way to break it.

I remember ties in football and even that it happened in state championship games--there was no rule on how to break a tie in those days which seems pretty weird considering ties were not that unusual.

+3

The premise that a tie is bad for the sport is faulty.

The obvious answer is a beer mile, or maybe a beer 4x4 if you want the sprinters involved.

D-3?

It gets settled by a game of quarters at the local bar.

rojo wrote:

So what do you think should be the best to break the tie is?

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spit roast your mom, whoever holds out longest wins; best two of three loads if you feel there's a difference between ends. thanks mom!

rojo's boy wrote:

[quote]rojo wrote:

So what do you think should be the best to break the tie is?

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Not necessarily in order....

1) The team with the highest GPA of the most recently completed semester or quarter. Transcripts submitted to officials before the start of the meet. But this idea might encourage cream puff courses during the semester/quarter in question.

2) The team with more qualifiers (aka meet participants).

3) don't do the team with more 1st places, then 2nd places, etc... that's kind of double dipping. More 9th place, or 10th place, etc finishes is better, but that's a pain for lane events that narrow down to 8 finalists

4) keep it a tie, it happens

5) IAAF scoring table average for all scores between the two teams.

6) whatever you do , most tie breakers are arbitrary and don't really determine the better team.

Mano a mano. You go at it again, but with a twist. 5 events are chosen and each team gets one competitor. It is a head to head matchup. The following events are chosen to encompass the full range of competition without doing everything again. With the field events, there is one attempt only, even if they both scratch or if both competitors tie.

400 meters

1500 meters

Long Jump - 1 jump only

Discus - 1 throw only

Pole Vault - 1 attempt only

Each team picks their best athlete to race a 600. Winner of the race wins the meet for their team.

There is a college called George Fox?

Simple. 4x100 m Thrower's Relay

coachcommentsnicely wrote:

We had four teams tie for 1st at the 4A Washington State Meet. All teams had a 4x4 in the final.

Not only that but a 5th team was 0.5 points behind 1st!

I don't think it should go by 9th places because those athletes aren't in the finals in most races. So there's not a clear-cut fair 9th place. (For example the person who was 5th in their heat but had a faster time than the person who was 3rd in theirs.)

I think I'd go with number of scoring events (not number of scoring athletes). If that's still tied, then maybe number of events where the team was top 7, then top 6, ... up to top 1.

But I also agree with those who said leaving it tied can be ok.

Paper, rock, scissors - shoot.

yhrebray wrote:

Most 1st place finishers.

If tied, go to most 2nd place finishers.

If tied through that, most 3rd place finishers.

Etc, etc, etc

Exactly...

Big man relay! Even if they don’t qualify take them for this just in case.

I agree. Concordia University once won the NAIA national womens' championship with zero points in running events. Way too many problems with basing it on a single running event.

I look to the decathlon tie breaker which is most individual events won, and if that fails, seconds, until you (almost certainly) have a winner.

The obvious answer wrote:

Obviously rock-paper-scissors- lizard - Spock

Fixed it for you.

Take the team with the most ninth place finishes, and then tenth and so on. Some people have objected to this idea, but I think it's better than the alternatives. Anyone who has scored points has already had her contributions counted. Giving the nod to the team with more wins just rewards teams that aren't as deep. Counting the 4x4 twice is biased toward sprints. In this meet, there were (at least) nine finalists in every event. Even if you have a meet on an 8-lane track, you can still use the prelim results. The prelims are supposed to be in conditions that are as similar to each other as possible. If it's fair to advance people from different heats based on time, why wouldn't it be fair to break a tie for the championship?

Circle jerk.

Focusing on the 4x400 to break a tie is arbitrary and clearly not fair.

Begin with the best finish in any event for each team and work backwards.

If school "A" has national champion in any event and the other doesn't, then school "A" wins. If school "A" and school "B" both had national champions, then look at the next best finish for each school in any event and compare place.