Problem

Source: Thailand Mathematical Olympiad 2017 day 1 p4

Tags: combinatorics, minimum



In a math competition, $14$ schools participate, each sending $14$ students. The students are separated into $14$ groups of $14$ so that no two students from the same school are in the same group. The tournament organizers noted that, from the competitors, exactly $15$ have participated in the competition before. The organizers want to select two representatives, with the conditions that they must be former participants, must come from different schools, and must also be in different groups. It turns out that there are $ n$ ways to do this. What is the minimum possible value of $n$?