Fantasy MBA Ranking Game: Rules, Prizes, & Bragging Rights

Introducing P&Q’s 2021 Fantasy MBA Ranking Game

It’s no secret that most MBA applicants are obsessed with rankings. They want to know who’s up and who’s down, who has momentum and who is sliding into relative obscurity. The results of each new ranking, whether from U.S. News & World Report or the Financial Times, are eagerly awaited by candidates, students, alumni and business school administrators.

So why not make a game of it? Last year we created the Fantasy MBA Ranking Game, where users can predict the Top 10 business schools that will land on the most influential MBA rankings to win prizes, and of course, bragging rights. It’s our version of the highly popular tournament brackets used to predict the winners of matchups among the NCAA basketball championship teams.

The game allows P&Q users to chance to predict the top ten in each of the year’s most influential MBA rankings before those updated lists come out.

With U.S. News about to unveil its latest MBA ranking on March 30th, we’re opening up 2021 brackets today!

P&Q users can create a profile and make predictions about the ranking list by dragging their Top 10 schools into a U.S. News bracket.  Players earn points for opening a new bracket (a new ranking prediction list), for every correctly placed school in its actual rank, and for community engagement.

Fantasy MBA Ranking Bracket Prizes

This year, there are five prize-winning brackets: U.S. News, Bloomberg Businessweek, Forbes, The Economist, and Poets&Quants. The players with the five highest scores in each bracket will win their choice of a Poets&Quants Hoodie or mug and the following cash value prizes: 1st Place: a $100 gift card, 2nd Place: a $50 gift card, and 3rd Place: a $25 gift card. Players can also choose to donate their individual bracket earnings to the nonprofit of their choice. Bracket winners will be announced two business days following each publication’s ranking analysis by Poets&Quants.

Fantasy MBA Ranking Grand Prize

Here’s where the game gets good. The Fantasy MBA Ranking Champion who scores the most points over the course of the game in 2021 will win the Grand Prize, a three-school admissions consulting package by a top firm recommended by Poets&Quants valued between $7,000 and $15,000 – or – a $1,000 cash prize.

Fantasy MBA Basic Rules & Teams

Although we are modeling the game after the highly popular sports fantasy leagues, there are a couple of major differences. Number one, there is no entrance fee. The game is free for users and open to all players who are, in accordance with our site policies, 13 years of age or older. Number two, there are just two teams – Poets and Quants – and the winners will be among these two groups based on the highest scores among all players. Poets, now is your chance to show the Quants you have stat skills, too.

Essentially, Fantasy MBA is an online guess-the-rankings contest with play-worthy prizes whether you’re a grad school hopeful or just a game fan. All players must be registered subscribers of Poets&Quants. Players found to be employees of schools that have gained early access to embargoed ranking lists are not eligible to receive the Grand Prize.

So, what are you waiting for? Here’s a cheat sheet for the first bracket, U.S. News‘ ranking published in 2020. All brackets are open NOW. The U. S. News bracket closes Monday, March 29th, at 12:01a.m.  Revisit the rules, prizes, and create your profile here. Good luck!