Long shot, but does anyone know how this tournament is structured? I’ve googled for a bit but can’t really find anything helpful.
I’ve watched the anime “Kuroko no Basuke”, and they mention that the tournament they show is special due to an anniversary. So I’m curious how the tournament works normally, in real life. I’ll explain how it works in the show, so anyone knowledgeable can explain how it differs. The tournament in the show is for boy teams only, and teams are comprised of high school students from all three grades.
In the show, each prefecture holds preliminaries, where the best 8 of the previous tournament, the Interhigh, compete. The winner of those preliminaries moves on to the Winter Cup, meaning that 47 teams join, each representing their prefecture. Additionally, the winner and runner-up of the Interhigh automatically qualify for the Winter Cup, bringing the number of competing teams up to 49. Also, for Tokyo alone, the runner-up of the Winter Cup preliminaries also joins, for a total of 50 teams. The 50 teams then compete in a bracket [as shown here](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/kurokonobasuke/images/1/13/WC_chart.png/revision/latest?cb=20120325183734).
https://www.reddit.com/r/japan/comments/xnr56i/high_school_winter_cup_tournament_structure/
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https://wintercup2021.japanbasketball.jp/outline/
This is the outline for the 2021 Winter Cup which lists how all the teams are selected and, AFAIK, is fairly standard. What about that isn’t clear?
This “special edition” sounds like a conceit that was developed for the anime, considering that last year’s entries were 60 teams each on the girls’ and boys’ sides.