We now know which lucky ducklings have advanced to nationals, so let’s set this scene for St. Louis. Just over a week to go!

Remember that we don’t have event finals anymore, so event titles are awarded based on the first day of competition, just like the all-around title. Six judges are used instead of four, with the high and the low dropped and the remaining four scores averaged, which as we learned last year gives us some really ugly decimal places like 9.8625. These extra judges were added to avoid having a thousand people get the same score and tie for titles. Unrelated: There was a six-way tie for the bars title last year.

Full draw

Semifinal #1 – April 20, 12:00 CT

[2] LSU – Beam
[3] UCLA – Vault
[6] Alabama – Bars
[10] Arkansas – Bye before floor
[11] Nebraska – Bye before bars
[18] Georgia – Floor

The significant story in this first group of six is Georgia’s very existence following its upset of #7 Michigan at regionals, an upset that turned inside out what should have been the more competitive of the two semifinals. Georgia claimed the spot at nationals when Michigan struggled through its regional performance while Georgia…also struggled through its regional performance? At least for the first two events. We’ll remember that one for a while because anyone who watched the first half of the meet would have thought there was no possible way Georgia could advance and that Illinois had the upset locked. But then no other team did noticeably better than Georgia, so it turned out that a theoretically disqualifying 48.950 floor score was a totally useful and respectable number in that meet.

The importance of rotation order also should not be overlooked in that one. Georgia got to end on its better events while Illinois had to start on its better events and end on its worst event. In a close meet, that kind of thing can make a difference. Continue reading Onward to St. Louis →

April 7, 4:00 CT, University of Alabama

Qualifying to nationals: Top 2 teams, top 2 all-arounders not on advancing teams, any event winners not on advancing teams

Teams (starting event)
[6] Alabama (floor)
[7] Michigan (beam)
[18] Georgia (bye before floor)
[22] Missouri (bye before bars)
[23] Illinois (bars)
[36] Central Michigan (vault)

Individual competitors
Ashley Potts, Northern Illinois (AA)
Madison Cindric, Arizona (AA)
Katherine Prentice, Northern Illinois (AA)
Mikailla Northern, Illinois-Chicago (AA)
Kierstin Sokolowski, Lindenwood (VT, BB)
Schyler Jones, TWU (VT)
Christina Berg, Arizona (UB)
Serena Baker, Illinois-Chicago (UB)
Mallory Moredock, TWU (BB)
Anna Martucci, Northern Illinois (FX)
Alexis Brawner, SEMO (FX)

The favorites

And so we move to our final regional, the giddily anticipated Alabama-Michigan-Georgia clash. It’s quite considerate of Georgia this year (like Stanford two years ago) to be ranked so low that the traditional snoozer 6-7-18 regional suddenly becomes the most interesting one. Theoretically. A poignant gift in the year we say goodbye to this trash format.

Still, the fundamental nature of the 6-7-18 regional is that it features two excellent teams that have proven their ability to score significantly better than the other schools in the meet and will go through with cleanly hit competitions. That’s the story for Alabama and Michigan here. For as dangerous as Georgia is (and Missouri and Illinois are), Alabama and Michigan will expect comfortable 197s for good meets at this point, and that’s going to be enough to advance.

A great day (yet realistic in an away, postseason context) for the other teams here would be a high 196, as score that would constitute a semi-miss for Alabama or Michigan. That doesn’t necessarily mean a counting fall. The somewhat sloppy bars rotation from Alabama at SECs took the final total down to 196.975, which would almost certainly still be enough to advance but would start to verge on a dangerous result. And if either Alabama or Michigan do count a fall, Georgia will expect to beat them.

If both teams hit their normal meets, however, it’s likely that they’ll simply be competing with each other for the entirely meaningless accolade of regional champion, a competition with very little to differentiate the two teams from each other. Beam is the strength and most pleasant event on which to watch both, but you worry about the full-lineup competitiveness on the power events when it comes to nationals. They’re really very similar teams.

Continue reading Tuscaloosa Regional Preview →

April 7, 4:00 ET, Penn State University

Qualifying to nationals: Top 2 teams, top 2 all-arounders not on advancing teams, any event winners not on advancing teams

Teams (starting event)
[5] Florida (floor)
[8] Washington (beam)
[17] Arizona State (bye before floor)
[27] West Virginia (bye before bars)
[29] Penn State (bars)
[30] New Hampshire (vault)

Individual competitors
Jacey Baldovino, Yale (AA)
Jade Buford, Yale (AA)
Kelsey Campbell, Bridgeport (AA)
Libby Groden, Rutgers (AA)
Sahara Gipson, Temple (VT)
Jaylene Everett, Temple (VT)
Jessica Wang, Yale (UB)
Kelli Tereshko, Bridgeport (UB)
Makenzey Shank, Rutgers (BB)
Kathryn Doran, Bridgeport (BB)
Maya Reimers, Bridgeport (FX)
Alex Hartke, Penn (FX)

The favorite

It hasn’t been quite the season expected of Florida so far, but Florida should nonetheless have this regional locked down. At SECs, we saw the Gators go 196.825 in a meet that included a counting fall, a score that would also be high enough to advance out of this regional. That means Florida doesn’t need to have figured out floor yet to get to nationals, but also yeah you do because it’s floor and come on.

Lost in Florida’s counting a fall on floor at SECs were the other three rotations, events where Florida performed at an excellent level that would have won the conference title and would have been a “Florida’s a thing again!” moment if maintained for all four pieces. That level reflected a definite step up from what we saw most of the regular season—particularly on beam. Of course, none of that mattered because of the weak floor rotation, something that cannot be dismissed just as “one of those things” because it’s not the first time that has happened in recent weeks. It’s two of the last three meets now, and it’s not even beam. Florida is having much more trouble filling out a competitive floor lineup in the post-Baker era than expected.

This is not for lack of options. Boren, Baumann, McMurtry, Slocum, Foberg, Gowey, Skaggs, Hundley, McLaughlin. More than enough strong gymnasts to be competitive. But which ones? Florida still has to figure out its best six and ensure that it’s not simply a lineup that can hit, but a lineup that starts at 9.850 (at least) and goes up from there because that’s what it will take to contend. “Hitting floor” is not the goal here. Winning nationals is the goal here. When those are your expectations, a hit for 9.775 is basically a fall—because neither is going to get it done. Lately, Florida has really had only the one definite 9.9 in the lineup, Boren. And that’s a problem.

This dynamic adds a little extra intrigue to Florida’s floor performance in the first rotation of this regional, but it’s weird intrigue because…it’s floor. Why are we even talking about whether Florida is going to hit floor? There’s no reason that rotation should be even in the vicinity of worrisome. It’s going to be fine. But will it though?

The fight

The second spot is Washington’s to lose. Washington outscores Arizona State most weeks, has gone into the 197s four times, and has five meet scores this season higher than ASU’s best. At the same time, this thing is close enough to be alive, and Washington will not feel completely comfortable heading in, especially after Pac-12s. Arizona State finished just three tenths behind Washington at Pac-12s, and that was with Washington performing in the evening session and Arizona State in the afternoon. The margin was just a half-tenth or so on most events, which is far too slim to be ignored. Continue reading University Park Regional Preview →

April 7, 4:00 MT, University of Utah

Qualifying to nationals: Top 2 teams, top 2 all-arounders not on advancing teams, any event winners not on advancing teams

Teams (starting event)
[4] Utah (floor)
[9] Cal (beam)
[16] Auburn (bye before floor)
[21] BYU (bye before bars)
[26] Stanford (bars)
[32] Southern Utah (vault)

Individual competitors
Kelley Hebert, UC Davis (AA)
Alexis Brown, UC Davis (AA)
Annie Juarez, Sacramento State (AA)
Caitlin Soliwoda, Sacramento State (AA)
Ellie Pascoe-Long, San Jose State (VT, FX)
Taylor Chan, San Jose State (VT, FX)
Kaitlin Won, San Jose State (UB)
Gabby Landess, UC Davis (UB)
Courtney Soliwoda, Sacramento State (BB)
Stephanie Relova, San Jose State (BB)

The favorite

36 years and counting. Utah is the only team to have advanced to NCAA gymnastics nationals in all 36 years in which that has been a thing that exists. (Alabama’s streak is 35 years, just missing 1982.) That streak will end one day, but this should not be the day. Utah comes in as the host of this regional and the definite favorite to advance in first place.

Utah may have slightly less margin for error in the quest to win this regional, having lost to Cal earlier this year and finishing .400 ahead of Cal at Pac-12s, but Utah will nonetheless expect a hit-meet advantage somewhere around 7 tenths over anyone else. That means Utah will still be able to advance with a slightly off meet (as shown in that Pac-12s performance) and likely advance even if counting a fall. Multiple things would have to go wrong for this to get interesting.

I expect Utah will enjoy this rotation order, even though floor-to-beam is totally the worst order, because beam is still the biggest question mark for the Utes in terms of confidence in hitting and the lineup (Burch or Soloski?). It’s also the one event where Cal outscored Utah at Pac-12s—and probably Auburn’s best event as well. If everything goes to plan, Utah will have used 49.4s to build up enough of a margin with the other three events that it takes pressure off the beam performance. We’ll know if Utah has the luxury of counting a fall before the team goes to beam.

The fight
 
In this second half of the six regionals, we enter meets where there’s a real ranking difference between the #2 and #3 seeds built on actual advantages/weaknesses exposed during the season, less like the total 50-50 affairs we see in the 12-13 and 11-14 regionals. In this one, Cal will enter as a favorite befitting its 7-spot ranking advantage, though not a prohibitive favorite. There’s not a fall between these teams. More like a couple landings. Continue reading Salt Lake City Regional Preview →