Sudden death

In a sport or game, sudden death (also sudden-death or a sudden-death round) is a form of competition where play ends as soon as one competitor is ahead of the others, with that competitor becoming the winner. Sudden death is typically used as a tiebreaker when a contest is tied at the end of regulation (normal) playing time or the completion of the normal playing task.

An alternative tiebreaker method to sudden death is to play an extra, shortened segment of the game. Sudden death playoffs typically end more quickly than the shortened play alternative. Reducing the variability of the event’s duration assists those scheduling television time and team travel. Fans may see sudden death as exciting and suspenseful, or they may view the format as compromising the sport, compared to play during regulation time.

Sudden death yields a victor for the contest without requiring a specific period of time. It may be called “next score wins” or similar, although in some games, the winner may result from penalizing the other competitor for a mistake. Sudden death has been called sudden victory to avoid the mention of death and serious disease, particularly in sports with a high risk of physical injury. This euphemism became one of announcer Curt Gowdy’s idiosyncrasies in 1971 when the AFC divisional championship game between the Kansas City Chiefs and Miami Dolphins went into overtime.

In contrast with the usual sudden-death procedure of awarding the victory to the next side to score, tennis require that the margin of victory be two.

The traditional requirement that a tennis set be won by two games sometimes resulted in men’s five-set matches lasting over six hours (including an 8-hour 11-minute set at Wimbledon) or, in women’s/doubles’ three-set matches, lasting over three hours, which is a major disruption to a television schedule. To shorten matches, sets tied at six games each can now be broken by a single tiebreaker game (for the U.S. Open & Olympics only, deciding set).

This is awarded to the first player to score seven points. The winner must lead the loser by two points, so tiebreaker games can become lengthy in their own right. (Exception applies to “super tiebreaker” since 2019, in which whoever scores 10 points or two straight points after a 9–all tie wins match (Australian Open only), provided the deciding set is tied at 6–all; at Wimbledon, this is employed at 12–all in deciding set).

Tiebreakers are not used in the final set at the French Open.