The week’s actual rankings can, as always, be found at RTN. But instead of doing a rankings post this week, I’m going to take a prospective look at where the teams currently stand according RQS/NQS (explained), which will take over starting next week.

This is where teams would be ranked, if qualifying scores were in place now. Bold scores must be retained as part of the six and can no longer be dropped.

I’ve also included my excel calculator here for those super nerds who want to play along at home:

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Oklahoma is obviously already set in terms of qualifying score and is basically just aiming for its all-time record of 198.120 at this point. The lead of 0.370 over Florida translates into 1.850 in pure meet scores, the amount Florida would have to gain on Oklahoma in counting scores over the next five weeks in order to supplant the Sooners at #1.

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Florida does have that road 196 still hanging around that it will expect to drop—though will not be able to do so this coming weekend, competing at home, which means Florida also won’t be able to catch OU. Dropping that road score should help close the gap with Oklahoma a little, but Florida won’t be sweating it because there’s such a comfortable lead over third place.

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UCLA will feel OK about already being 3rd in the qualifying score race despite a number of eh performances in the 196s hanging around here that the team will expect to drop. The #3 ranking is, however, increasingly looking like the ceiling for UCLA because there’s already a road 197.5 that has to count, which is much lower than what Oklahoma and Florida are looking at counting. Florida’s probably not going to end up using anything lower than 197.8.

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This is where I would insert that GIF of the woman leaving the Big Brother house if it wouldn’t screw up the formatting of the whole thing. LSU 2020 is the kind of team the qualifying score system exists to serve—a team with a high potential peak that started slowly but can end up dropping all of those low scores because less than half the meets count. It took one weekend of good numbers to shoot LSU right to about where you would expect this team to be ranked.

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Denver won’t be concerned about the scores here, having recorded enough low-mid 197s to be in solid shape to maintain this kind of ranking for the remainder of the season. Of actual concern will be the injury to Lynnzee Brown on floor to end the meet on Sunday, something Denver cannot afford.

Continue reading Qualifying Score Outlook →