Running League Matches
League play has one thing that practices and scrimmages don’t: someone else set the schedule. Your league publishes a full season of match dates weeks — sometimes months — in advance, and your job is to figure out who can play before it’s too late to ask for a reschedule.
There’s a second wrinkle too. A match isn’t just “how many people can make it.” You’re fielding your side of several lines, and on a mixed team, the split between men and women isn’t a preference — it’s a requirement. You could have eight players say yes and still not be able to take the court if the ratio is off. Headcount Buddy knows what your match format requires and checks your confirmed players against it, so when you ask “are we set for Saturday?” you get a real answer, not just a raw number. (For more on how that requirement is expressed for your team, see the headcount page.)
Collecting availability for the season — all at once
When the schedule drops, you don’t want to fire off a separate text for every match. That’s ten matches, ten texts per player, ten rounds of back-and-forth. Instead, you can ask Headcount Buddy to reach out to the whole roster in one pass:
You: Ask everyone about our upcoming matches.
Each teammate gets a single text listing every match they haven’t answered yet, something like:
Headcount Buddy → your player: Hey! Can you let me know about these matches?
A — Sat Jun 7 at 10am vs Westside B — Sat Jun 14 at 10am vs Lakewood C — Sat Jun 21 at 10am vs North End
Reply with the letters you CAN play (e.g. “A B”), the ones you CAN’T (e.g. “not C”), or just “all” if you’re free for all of them.
Players can reply however makes sense — a few letters, a quick “all,” or a note for specific ones. They’re not locked in. Early answers are treated as tentative, and they can change any of them at any time just by texting back.
Players who’ve already answered every match won’t get a message at all. Only the open ones hit their phones.
Why early — and what “tentative” means
The reason to do this weeks out is simple: if a match is going to be short, you need to know while you still have time to contact the league and ask for a different date. That window closes fast.
Answers this far out are held as tentative, not firm commitments. As each match gets closer, Headcount Buddy will follow up with that player to confirm. Think of the early reply as “I expect to be free” — useful for planning, but not the final word.
Checking the schedule any time
You don’t need to wait for players to trickle in before you can see where things stand. At any point, just ask:
You: How’s the match schedule looking?
Headcount Buddy: Here’s where your matches stand:
Jun 7 vs Westside — 4 in, 2 tentative, 1 out, 3 no reply — short Jun 14 vs Lakewood — 6 in, 1 tentative, 2 no reply — ready Jun 21 vs North End — 3 in, 4 no reply — short
You’ll see who’s confirmed, who’s tentative, who declined, who hasn’t answered yet, and which matches are at risk — all without asking anyone anything.
The last week: normal reminders take over
This combined availability ask is designed for matches more than about a week out. Once a match is a week away or closer, Headcount Buddy shifts to the regular per-event flow — targeted reminders to anyone who hasn’t settled, and a confirmation to players who are already confirmed that the event is on and they don’t need to do anything. You don’t need to do anything to trigger that switch; it happens on its own.
For more on how reminders and confirmations work as a match approaches, see the RSVPs and events pages.
When something changes
If the match time or location changes — or if the match gets called off — Headcount Buddy notifies everyone who needs to know and asks confirmed players to re-confirm. You don’t have to chase that down manually.
Getting started
If you’d like to set up your team or have questions, email us at help@headcountbuddy.com.