Playoffs

This article is about scheduled postseason playoff systems. For a bye in sports, see Bye (sports). For ad-hoc tiebreaker matches, see One-game playoff. For other uses, see playoff (disambiguation).

The playoffs (in United States and Canada), postseason, climax (in Japan), or finals series (in Australia and New Zealand) of a is a stage of a sports league played after the regular season of a competition by the top competitors to determine the league champion or a similar accolade. Depending on the league, the playoffs may be either a single game, a series of games, or a tournament, and may use a single-elimination system or one of several other different playoff formats. Playoff, in regard to international fixtures, is to qualify or progress to the next round of a competition or tournament.

In team sports in the U.S. and Canada, the vast distances and consequent burdens on cross-country travel have led to regional divisions of teams. Generally, during the regular season, teams play more games in their division than outside it, but the league's best teams might not play against each other in the regular season. Therefore, in the postseason a playoff series is organized. Any group-winning team is eligible to participate, and as playoffs became more popular they were expanded to include second- or even lower-placed teams – the term "wild card" refers to these teams.

In association football, playoffs are often used in the qualification for international tournaments such as the FIFA World Cup. They offer a second chance to the teams failing to qualify directly, and may be regional or intercontinental. In England and Scotland, playoffs are used to decide promotion for lower-finishing teams, rather than to decide a champion in the way they are used in North America. In the EFL Championship (the second tier of English football), teams finishing 3rd to 6th after the regular season compete to decide the third promotion spot to the Premier League.

The term "post-season" is also used in individual sports such as the sport of athletics or swimming to describe the period of championship meetings (such as regional championships, NCAA conference championships, national championships, or world championships) or their qualifiers after the regular season has concluded.

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