King Of The Court is a type of tournament in which players rotate partners until, ideally, everyone has played with everyone else. At the end you see which individual player won the most, and that player is anointed King. It's a way to make an individual contest out of a doubles event.
Below is a format that satisfies our basic requirements: each player must play on a team with each other player once, and must face each other player twice. Additionally, it attempts to even out play on the two courts. A lot of math and number-crunching went into this. Various solutions were arrived at in different ways by John Greensage, John Kirkland, and Conrad Damon. We'll spare you the math. The solution below and court assignments are from Kirkland.
To begin, players draw numbers 1-8 out of a hat. The chart below shows the teams and which courts they play on. Player 1 spends the day on Court A, while the others split their games between the two courts.
| Court A | Court B |
|---|---|
| 1 / 2 vs 3 / 4 | 5 / 6 vs 7 / 8 |
| 1 / 3 vs 6 / 8 | 2 / 4 vs 5 / 7 |
| 1 / 8 vs 2 / 7 | 3 / 6 vs 4 / 5 |
| 1 / 7 vs 3 / 5 | 2 / 8 vs 4 / 6 |
| 1 / 5 vs 4 / 8 | 2 / 6 vs 3 / 7 |
| 1 / 4 vs 6 / 7 | 2 / 3 vs 5 / 8 |
| 1 / 6 vs 2 / 5 | 4 / 7 vs 3 / 8 |
Score sheet for 8 players