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For Commissioners·7 min read·February 16, 2026

The Complete Guide to Running a Rec League

Running a league is a big job. Rosterlytic gives commissioners the tools to manage every aspect — from creating the league and configuring settings to generating schedules and managing team membership. This guide covers it all.

Creating a league

Any user can create one league on the free tier. Premium subscriptions unlock unlimited leagues and advanced features like round-robin scheduling and playoff brackets. To create a league:

  1. Go to the Leagues screen
  2. Tap Create League
  3. Enter your league name
  4. Select the sport
  5. Optionally join with your own team, or manage as commissioner only

You'll automatically become the commissioner. A unique join code is generated that team captains will use to join your league.

Sharing the join code

From the league admin screen, you can:

  • Copy the join code to your clipboard
  • Share a pre-formatted invite message with the league name and code

Team captains can join a league on the free tier as well.

League settings

Commissioners can configure several important settings from the Admin tab:

Scoring system

Set how many league points teams earn for each result:

  • Win points — Points awarded for a win
  • Tie points — Points awarded for a tie
  • Loss points — Points awarded for a loss (usually 0)

Rosterlytic provides sport-specific defaults (e.g., Hockey uses 2/1/0, Soccer uses 3/1/0), but you can customize them however you like.

Tiebreaker rules

When teams have the same league points, tiebreakers determine who ranks higher. You can set the order of tiebreaker rules:

  1. League Points — Total points from wins/ties/losses
  2. Wins — Total number of wins
  3. Point Differential — Goals/runs/points scored minus allowed
  4. Points For — Total goals/runs/points scored
  5. Win Percentage — Wins divided by games played
  6. Losses — Fewest losses (lower is better)

Drag to reorder them based on your league's preferences. The rules are enforced server-side so standings are always consistent.

Commissioner-only stats mode

By default, team captains can enter their own player stats. If you want tighter control, enable commissioner-only stats mode from the Admin tab. When enabled, only commissioners can enter player stats for any game in the league. Team captains will still be able to view stats and leaderboards, but the stats entry button won't appear for them on league games.

Multi-commissioner support

You don't have to run the league alone. Rosterlytic supports multiple commissioners per league:

  1. From the Admin tab, find the Commissioner Code
  2. Share this code with your co-commissioner
  3. They join the league using this code (separate from the team join code)

Co-commissioners have the same permissions as the league creator — they can enter scores, manage teams, edit settings, and run brackets. This is especially useful for larger leagues where one person can't be at every game.

Fee tracking

Commissioners can track league fees to keep tabs on who's paid:

  1. Set a fee amount per player from the league's Teams tab
  2. View a breakdown by team: expected fees, collected, and outstanding
  3. Mark individual players as paid, partially paid, or unpaid
  4. Add notes per player (e.g., "paid cash week 3")

Fee tracking is available on the League plan and works on both the mobile app and the web dashboard. Team captains can also manage team-level fees (like uniform costs) from their own team settings.

Recalculating standings

If you change the scoring system or tiebreaker rules mid-season, tap Recalculate Standings to apply the new rules to all existing games across all seasons.

Creating seasons

Seasons organize your league's schedule and standings. To create one:

  1. Go to the Admin tab
  2. Tap Create Season
  3. Configure the details:
    • Name — Rosterlytic suggests one automatically (e.g., "Spring 2026")
    • Start Date — When the season begins
    • Schedule Type — Manual (you create games individually) or Round-Robin (auto-generated)
    • Meetings Per Matchup — How many times each pair of teams plays (1, 2, or 3)
    • Game Day — Default day of the week for games
    • Default Time — Default start time
    • Bye Weeks — Weeks to skip (holidays, etc.)

Starting a new season from a previous one

When a season is completed, you can start the next one pre-filled from the previous season:

  1. Go to the completed season
  2. Tap Start Next Season
  3. The new season auto-fills with the previous season's settings and auto-increments the name
  4. Adjust anything you need and save

This saves time when your league runs the same format season after season.

Generating a round-robin schedule

Round-robin scheduling automatically creates a balanced schedule where every team plays every other team. Here's how it works:

  1. Create a season with Round-Robin schedule type
  2. Make sure all teams have joined the league
  3. Tap Generate Schedule

Rosterlytic handles the rest:

  • Every team plays every other team the number of times you specified (meetings per matchup)
  • Home and away are alternated — if Team A is home in cycle 1, they're away in cycle 2
  • Bye weeks are automatically skipped
  • Games are scheduled on your default game day and time
  • You need at least 2 teams to generate a schedule

After generation, you can still edit individual games to adjust dates, times, or locations.

Adding games manually

You can also create individual league games at any time:

  1. Go to the Schedule tab
  2. Tap the + button
  3. Select the home team and away team
  4. Set the date, time, and location
  5. Optionally assign a week number

This is useful for makeup games, special matchups, or leagues that don't use round-robin.

Managing teams

Viewing teams

The Teams tab shows all teams in the league with their captains and current W-L-T records. Tap any team to see their full roster and details.

Removing a team

Commissioners can remove a team from the league. This is a significant action — it deletes all of that team's games, standings, and league membership. Use it carefully.

Handling withdrawal requests

Team captains can request to withdraw their team from the league. When a request comes in:

  1. You'll see it in the Admin tab under pending requests
  2. Review the request and the captain's reason (if provided)
  3. Approve — The team is removed and all their games/standings are cleaned up
  4. Deny — The team stays in the league

Season lifecycle

Completing a season

When your season is finished:

  1. Go to Season Management
  2. Tap Complete Season

Completing a season locks all games from further editing. Standings become final. This prevents accidental score changes after the season is over.

Reopening a season

Made a mistake? Commissioners can reopen a completed season to allow game edits again. Go to the season and tap Reopen Season. This restores full editing capability.

Deleting a season

If you need to start over entirely, you can delete a season. This permanently removes all games, standings, and bracket data for that season. This cannot be undone.

Entering scores

Commissioners enter scores for league games from the Schedule tab:

  1. Tap on a game
  2. Enter the home and away scores
  3. Save

Once both scores are present, the game automatically completes and standings are recalculated. If a season is completed, scores are locked unless you reopen it.

Tips

  • Set up your scoring system before the season starts — Changing it mid-season requires recalculating all standings
  • Use round-robin for balanced schedules — It ensures every team gets fair matchups
  • Complete seasons when they're done — It prevents accidental edits and makes historical records clean
  • Use "Start Next Season" — It saves a lot of setup time between seasons
  • Handle withdrawal requests promptly — Teams waiting to leave can create awkward scheduling situations

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