LIV Golf tweaked the format of its season-ending team championship by eliminating first-round byes and introducing a play-in match.
The 13-team league will stage a play-in match on Wednesday of the LIV Golf Team Championship at Saint John's Resort in Plymouth, Mich., between the teams who sit 12th and 13th in the standings at the conclusion of the regular season. The winner will advance to the quarterfinals.
Meanwhile, there is no first-round bye for the top seeds as in prior years.
"I think you'll
see a few teams get knocked out that you maybe wouldn't expect," said Australia's Cameron Smith in a LIV Golf news release. Smith captains the defending team champion, Ripper GC.
"More pressure. Each day matters more," Crushers captain Bryson DeChambeau added.
The play-in will be held Aug. 20, then the remaining 12 teams head to the course on Aug. 22 for the quarterfinals. For the semifinals on Aug. 23, six teams will be in the championship bracket and the three winners will move on to the stroke-play finals on Aug. 24.
In other changes to the format, all 48 players from those teams will compete and the captains of the higher-seeded teams will be given the advantage of seeing his opponent's lineup before finalizing the matchups.
Legion XIII, captained by Spaniard Jon Rahm, currently lead the team standings ahead of DeChambeau's Crushers in second and Spaniard Sergio Garcia's Fireballs GC in third. The current bottom two teams are Majesticks GC, captained by Sweden's Henrik Stenson, and Kevin Na's Iron Heads GC.
--Field Level Media
