Sasuke and Sakura: Friends or Foes? - S1-E3
Continuity mistake: During the scene where Naruto and Sasuke accidentally kiss, Naruto's whiskers are gone.
Continuity mistake: At the beginning when the Stone faces, of the past and present Hokage, are shown from a distance. The two on the right is looking straight ahead and the one on the far left is looking to the left. But when a close up of the heads are shown, the two on the right are looking to the right and the one on the left is looking straight ahead.
Answer: Out-of-character, because single elimination is the most exciting format for the viewers of the anime. In-character, a possible reason is that the failure of single elimination to correctly identify the second and lower places was only recognised relatively recently - there is an essay by Lewis Carroll (yes, that Lewis Carroll), describing the problem in detail, written in 1883. Ninjas were around in about the 1300's, so it probably hasn't been discovered yet. Of course Naruto's history might not match real history but if you depart from reality then there can be no answer but the out-of-character one.
Moose ★