The SpinShare SpeenLeague is bursting onto the scene! Following a year of successes with the SpinShare SpeenOpen, the SpeenLeague puts the world’s best players against each other.

If you are not familiar with what SpinShare is, follow this link to learn more.

How does the SpeenLeague work?

The SpinShare SpeenLeague is a 12-player, two-stage league that pits the world’s best players against each other. The tournament consists of two stages: the group stage and the playoff (bracket) stage. While the first roster is invite-only, there is also a promotion and relegation system between seasons.

The Group Stage

The group stage consists of two groups of 6 players—one from the Americas, and one from Europe—with Europe’s matches happening on Saturday and Americas happening on Sunday. The group stage is double round-robin, meaning each player in the group will play every other member of the group twice. Matches in the group stages are best of 4, with contestants playing two matches each week of the five-week group stage. Pool results are determined by the following criteria in order:

• Head-to-head record (if two players have identical records, the head-to-head winner is higher)
• If records are completely equal, a tiebreaker match is played

The top 4 players advance to the playoffs, with 1st place getting a second-round bye and 4th place entering in the loser’s bracket. The bottom 2 players go to relegations, where they may be challenged by top players outside the SpeenLeague for their spots.

You can find the full schedule of matches here.

The Playoffs

The SpeenLeague playoffs are done in a double-elimination bracket. However, the bracket is not completely standard: the top player in each pool gets a bye to round 2, while the 4th place player goes to loser’s bracket. The 2nd and 3rd place players face their opponents from the other pool in the first round, as seen below:

The winner’s and loser’s bracket will be best of 5, while Loser’s Round 3 is best of 7 along with both Winner’s and Loser’s Finals. The Grand Finals (and the potential bracket reset) will be best of 9. In the end, we will crown one winner the SpeenLeague champion!

Relegations

While the top 4 players go to playoffs, the bottom 2 players of each pool go to relegations to keep their spot in the league. The 6th place player of each pool must survive two challenges to keep their spot, while the 5th place player must survive only one. Their opponents will consist of the top players not already in SpeenLeague, determined by circuit points. The top 2 players will get to challenge two players for their spot; if they lose, they still have a chance!

How about the map pool?

Each SpinShare SpeenLeague will use a subset of the map pool from the previous SpeenOpen. This will allow players to demonstrate their skill on a limited pool of charts while placing a focus on the most challenging charts the game has to offer. The group stage has two map pools, each consisting of 35-44 and 40-49 difficulty songs, respectively. After the first round robin is completed, the tournament will switch from group pool 1 to pool 2. During the playoffs, contestants play the 50-59 and 60-64 charts leading up to the finals; where a limited selection of 60+ charts, never before seen in tournament play, awaits them!

It all goes down here…

The SpinShare SpeenLeague starts on Saturday, February 20, 2021, at 1pm EST/6pm UTC, with the Eurasian league; the Americas league begins on Sunday, February 21, 2021, at 7pm EST/12am UTC. Watch the best of the best throw down each weekend on the SpinShare Twitch channel! You can keep up with the latest SpinShare-related news on the Discord server.