Not necessarily true. One bracket was stacked with the toughest teams in some age divisions, basically making it impossible for the 2 strongest teams to advance to the finals. While other brackets in these same age divisions were light and some weaker teams had an easier path to the finals.
Stacked brackets, which was not the case here if you look at the National Draw 2017 Final Four, is a very different discussion from degrading a team championship based on the fact that specific other teams did not attend.
