A new pool draw format makes its debut.
October 6, 2026 by Charlie Eisenhood in News
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Earlier today on Deep Look, the pool draw for the men’s division pools at Club Nationals took place with a brand new format for 2026.
The Club Guidelines were revised last winter to group teams by rating proximity in the post-Regionals rankings and then randomize within those groupings, rather than creating pots from the ranked order alone. (The full guidelines are below.)
As the #1 ranked team, Chicago Machine was guaranteed the #1 seed, and New York PoNY and Portland Rhino Slam locked in the #2 and #3 seeds, respectively. The groupings were as follows:
Pot 1: Chicago Machine
Pot 2: New York PoNY
Pot 3: Portland Rhino Slam!
Pot 4: San Francisco Revolver, Boston Dig
Pot 5: Raleigh Ring of Fire, Minneapolis Sub Zero, Atlanta Chain Lightning, Washington DC Truck Stop, Philadelphia Pacmen, Toronto GOAT, Seattle Sockeye
Pot 6: Denver Johnny Bravo, Vancouver Furious George
Pot 7: Montreal Mephisto
Pot 8: Austin Doublewide
Adam Goff, the USA Ultimate Foundation Board President and National Club Men’s Director, joined Deep Look to randomly draw the ordering within each pot, yielding the following pools:
Want to watch Club Nationals? Stay tuned for Ultiworld’s livestreaming schedule, which, for the first time, will include every single bracket game from prequarters through finals! More details to come later this week.
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The full seeding rules are as follows:
- Step one – teams will be placed in power rating order.
- Step two – teams will be divided into six pots determined by the five biggest gaps between teams’ power ratings.
- Step three – if any pot of four or more teams has a power rating difference of 100 or more, that pot will be divided into two pots at the biggest gap between teams’ power ratings.
- Step four – teams in Pot 1 are placed into their pools in Power Rating Order.
- Step five – Any one team pots are assigned their Pool placement.
- Step six – starting with Pot 2 and following in order, draw the spot then the team. Repeat for remaining pots.
- No pool shall have 3 or more teams from one region
