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Coming back to playoff formats for a moment, there are a lot interesting formats that have been used over the years. Crossover qualifiers, byes in the second or third round, round-robins in the second round, etc., but one that I mostly forgotten about until checking back on earlier seasons was used by the OHL in the early to mid-1980s.
Series traditionally use the "best of" format where the team has to win the majority of games in the series, e.g. four out of seven. But the OHL used a "total points" format—that is, the team to first reach a set number of points in the series advanced, e.g. eight points. What this means is that tie games in the playoffs counted towards the series results.
So, for example, in an 8 point series, say one team wins the first three games of the series. It would be leading the series 6 points to 0. If the fourth game ended in a tie, the team would then be leading the series 7 points to 1. That means the team could win the series by simply getting a tie in the fifth game (in which case it would win the series 8 points to 2). A win would be more than enough to advance (it would win the series 9 points to 1).
Certainly a different take on the way a playoff series can be conducted...
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