The 2016 USBC will be held in accordance with the USBF General Conditions of Contest and the Special Conditions of Contest for this event. After entries have closed, the Conditions of Play will contain those sections of the Special Conditions of Contest that apply to this year's event.

Overall Format

This year we are continuing with a simpler approach to the overall event format. The USBC will have five stages and each stage will be 2 days long. The first stage will be a complete Round Robin among the sixteen teams that do not have byes to the Knockout stage of the competition. Twelve teams will qualify from the Round Robin to the Round of 16, to join the Diamond & Fireman teams who have byes to the Round of 16. The remaining four stages will be 120 board Knockout rounds.

Setting the Bracket for the Knockout Stages

One somewhat complex part of the Conditions of Contest for this event is how teams are assigned bracket positions for the Knockout stage. Here's how it works:

-- The Gordon team, with a bye to the Quarterfinal, will be assigned bracket position 1.

-- The Diamond team, with a bye to the Round of 16 and the second highest number of Positioning Points, will be assigned bracket position 2.

-- The Fireman team and the highest seeded team to qualify from the Round Robin, will be randomly assigned to bracket positions 3 and 4 (the highest seeded team to qualify from the Round Robin will be Nickell unless Nickell does not qualify or Fleisher finishes first or second in the Round Robin & Nickell does not finish in the top 4, in which case Fleisher will be the highest seeded team to qualify from the Round Robin.

-- The next two highest seeded teams to qualify from the Round Robin will be randomly assigned to bracket positions 5 and 6.

-- The next two highest seeded teams to qualify from the Round Robin will be randomly assigned to bracket positions 7 and 8.

-- The next two highest seeded teams to qualify from the Round Robin will be randomly assigned to bracket positions 9 and 10.

-- The next two highest seeded teams to qualify from the Round Robin will be randomly assigned to bracket positions 11 and 12.

-- The remaining 3 teams to qualify from the Round Robin will be randomly assigned to bracket positions 13, 14, and 15.

After all of this random assignment is over, the winner of the Round Robin will have the right to a reshuffle. If the winner of the Round Robin is also the highest seeded team to qualify from the Round Robin, so was shuffled with Fireman, their reshuffle will be with the team that was assigned to the bracket position two below that of the Round Robin winner (a bye team is exempt from a reshuffle).