Gather Your Friends and Compete

NSPA General Tournament Rules

All NSPA Spades Tournaments are open to the public for adults 21 years of age or older.  Each team must consist of two (2) players.

Each Tournament features a single elimination format with all teams guaranteed a minimum of two (2) games.  Each team must beat their opponent 2 out of 3 games played to 300 points each (1-Hour and 15-Minute time limit per round) in order to advance to the next round.

THE DECK
-  52 card standard deck containing no Jokers.
-  Ace will be the high card in each suit, and will follow accordingly:  Ace, King, Queen, Jack, Ten, etc.

THE DEAL
-  Cards will be dealt clockwise with a cut to the right.  
-  No French cutting.
-  All 52 cards will be dealt to players with no kitty.  
-  There will be no surrendering of your hand because of the lack of spades, face cards, etc., a player must play each hand dealt.

BIDDING
-  Each individual will bid their own hand, starting with the dealer and moving clockwise. The sum of your team player’s individual bids will be the bid for your team for that dealt hand.
-  Minimum team bid of four (4) per hand.
-  No nil bidding.
-  No low bidding.

PLAY
-  Once the bids are recorded play will start with the first person on the left of the dealer.
-  A player may lead whit any suit he/she chooses, but a player may not “cut” or “trump” a book unless they do not possess any cards of the lead suit.
-  If a team catches another team “reneging”, then upon producing the exact book or trick that the infraction occurred, the team will be awarded three (3) of the other team’s books.

SCORING
Scoring will be based on multiples of 10 and -10.

Let’s use an example for clear understanding of the scoring process.

** Team XYZ bids 6 books.

* If team XYZ gets 6 books of tricks then their score for that hand would be 60.

*    If team XYZ makes over their bid, let’s say in this case eight (8) books, then the
    teams score would be sixty (60) points for making their bid plus two (2) points
for going two (2) over their bid for a total of sixty-two (62) points.

*    If a team gets any amount under their bid, in this case 1,2,3,4, or 5 books, then
the team gets -10 times their bid, or in this case -60.

* If a bid of ten (10) is reached, then the team will get a bonus of 100 points added to their score at that point.


Note:
Talking across the table, passing cards, hand signals, or any other activity that constitutes cheating will not be tolerated and are ground for immediate ejection.