Here's an all too common situation that busts players out of tournaments:
You are in middle-late position with 2300 in your stack, blinds at 50/100. It's folded to you, and your cards are 88. You raise to 300, the cutoff folds, and the button raises to 900. The blinds fold, and it's 600 to you. Your stack is short enough that you don't mind taking a coin flip to try and double up. You push all in, get called by AK, and he spikes an ace on the river to beat you, even though you were a slight favorite when the money went in. You're out of the tournament.
There is a relatively simple play called the stop and go that can get you past this hurdle. Instead of pushing all in before the flop with your 88, try smooth calling his reraise (the stop). Then, on the flop, since you are first to act, you push (the go) all in on any flop. Now you are representing a made hand or a pocket pair. Your bet is almost the size of the pot (1400 into a 1950 pot), so it is large enough to get your opponent to fold all but a made hand or a very good draw. Since two-thirds of flops miss unpaired cards, you have a very good chance of winning the pot right here.
Compare the equity of 88 versus AK:
All in preflop:
88: 55.5%
AK: 44.5%
All in on the flop with no A or K (and no significant draws):
88:74.5%
AK:25.5%
All in preflop, you will get calls from AK and probably AQ in those situations. The chance that they are in a coinflip is quite high, and the chance that you have a weaker ace is enough to make that a snap call for most players. Although you have a slight edge in that hand, they get to see all five cards, so the chance of beating you is higher and you have no control over the results. This makes coinflips a very high variance situation. There is enough variance in tournaments for us to be willing to create more.
Now, if you push all in with 88 on a T62 rainbow flop, you want to get a call from AK, since you have them dominated at 3-1.
There are five conditions necessary to successfully pull off the stop and go play:
1) You will be first to act on the flop. This is absolutely necessary, since you need to give your opponent an opportunity to fold.
2) Your hand is too good to fold preflop given your tournament position (usually done when your stack is short, but not so short that you must get a double up).
3) Your chip stack is not big enough to get them to fold preflop by four betting all in.
4) You are willing to push all in on the flop regardless of the cards on the flop. Yes, this means you will be betting with 88 on an ace high flop sometimes, and your opponent will be sitting there with AK. However, sometimes you'll bet with 88 on an AK4 flop, and your opponent will fold 99, a hand that has you crushed.
5) Your remaining stack after calling preflop will be enough to get them to fold the flop if they missed. If your bet will be 100 into a 2000 pot, you have no fold equity, as they will be forced to call you with any two cards.
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