This pulled the winner from a previous game into the next slot.

He labeled columns: A: Game # | B: Round | C: Winner’s Bracket Matchup | D: Loser Goes To...

Mark’s solution: Step 2: Building the Winners Bracket (The Upper Path) Mark opened a blank Excel sheet. He used one column per round and one row per game slot .

=IF(ISBLANK(E2), "", "Winner of Game " & A2) But he kept it simple at first: just empty cells for user input. This is where beginners cry. In double elimination, after Round 1, the losers drop down to the losers bracket and must fight through to meet the winners bracket champion in the finals.

And that’s the story of how one spreadsheet saved a weekend.

6 losers from WB Round 1 play in 3 games. LB2: 3 winners from LB1 + 8 losers from WB Round 2 = 11 teams? That doesn’t work (odd number). This is the trap.