"Most Winningest" Regular Season

Number Theory Level pending

Ten teams play in a regular season of basketball, where each team plays each other team once and only once. Any team that wins seven or more games will make it to the playoffs. What is the maximum number of teams that can make it to the playoffs?


The answer is 5.

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1 solution

Tristan Shin
Feb 3, 2015

There will be a total of ( 10 2 ) = 45 \binom{10}{2}=45 regular season games. If we want the most teams to win seven games, we can start with the floor when 45 45 is divided by 7 7 . This is 6 6 . However, if 6 6 teams win 7 7 games each, that leaves 3 3 wins among 4 4 teams. With these 4 4 teams alone, there must be ( 4 2 ) = 6 \binom{4}{2}=6 wins, so this is not possible. Now, we can try 5 5 teams. This leaves 10 10 more wins among 5 5 teams. As ( 5 2 ) = 10 \binom{5}{2}=10 , this works. Thus, we can have 5 \boxed{5} teams that can make the playoffs.

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