Round 3

This enormous tournament begins with accelerated pairings, which means that the top half of the teams only play against one another.  But after two rounds, the field opens up to all.  This typically means that in the third round, a top seed would expect to play one of the better teams from the lower half of the field, getting a bit of a breather, actually.  However, the tournament also uses Swiss pairings, in which the top teams play relatively stronger opponents rather than playing against the lowest-seeded opponents, as they would in a single-elimination bracket tournament.
So, because of the end of accelerated pairings, I thought we would be playing 67 seed or perhaps a lucky 92. But, because of Swiss pairings, we are not*.  We are up against 17 seed Riverside Brookfield.  So we will not have it easy.  Then again, we are clearly favored, and the coach of Riverside Brookfield reminded me, with a note of regret, if not doomed resignation, that this is the third time they have faced us in the past 12 months, and we have never gone easy on them before.

*Note: If you look at the Tables below, note that Tables 4 on down are facing opponents seeded at least 40 places lower, but 3 faces 28, while 1 and 2 face 16 and 17, respectively.