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Saturday, 21 March 2026 01:42

Race to Regionals: Mid-Weekend Update

Friday's meets greatly narrowed the field down to 37 teams for 36 spots at Regionals.  Now the focus will turn to the Top Seeds, which can disrupt anticipated Regional placements.

The NQS is the National Qualifying Score, calculated by taking up to five of the team's lowest home scores, adding all the away scores, removing the high and low from that set, and averaging the rest.  The Max NQS is the highest the NQS can be, and the Min is the lowest.  The Low is the lowest score that is currently being dropped, while the High is score currently the highest score that is being dropped.  Scoring below or above these scores is how the Min RQS and Max RQS are calculated.  Note that some teams have more than five home scores and the lowest five are taken, before the new High score is determined.      

Top 16 Seeds

The Top 16 teams will be assigned to "quartets" of four teams, based on their NQS rank:  1-8-9-16, 2-7-10-15, 3-6-11-14, 4-5-12-13.  A Regionals host will "anchor" the quartet into that Regional assignment.  Currently, LSU anchors the second pairing into the LSU Region.  However, if Kentucky is able to land in the Top 16, they will draw that quartet into that Regional, disrupting the other Regional placements.  The remaining two Regionals would be assigned based on geographical proximity. The other two hosts are not contending for Top 16 seeds.  

Teams #14 to #22 are still in contention for the Top 16.  Any sequence of scores could juggle the rankings, but we've highlighted the Kentucky scores due to the seeding impact that could occur if they were to land in position 14 (least likely), 15 or 16.  If they were to land in #15 and LSU stayed #2, the lower seeded host would be exchanged in an adjacent quartet.  Note that Auburn was another team limited by the five home score limit.  In #16, they are most at risk of the current seeded teams.        

  14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22
  Cal Clemson Auburn PSU Ohio State Kentucky NCSU Iowa UNC
NQS 196.698 196.644 196.547 196.5222 196.5219 196.503 196.448 196.447 196.433
Max NQS 196.745 196.686 196.613 196.595 196.592 196.594 196.511 196.525 196.510
Min NQS 196.593 196.564 196.498 196.470 196.436 196.261 196.368 196.285 196.245
Low 195.55 195.925 196.05 196 195.75 194.325 195.575 194.825 194.55
High 197.225 197.025 197.2 197.25 197.15 197.325 197.15 197.225 197.2

Top 28 Seeds

The top 28 (or so, based on the committee discretion), are seeded directly into the second round at Regionals and avoid the playin round.  This set of teams is pretty secure, but #30 Arizona still technically has a shot at the Top 28, but it would require some a very high score from Arizona and near season lows for Maryland and USU (SJSU cannot move up).  Note that Arizona is one of the teams with six home scores, and their season high was already removed from the total.  Only one of their away scores is higher than one of their six home scores.     

  27 28 29 30
  Maryland USU SJSU Arizona
NQS 195.900 195.855 195.717 195.691
Max NQS 195.970 195.948 195.780 195.794
Min NQS 195.784 195.782 195.613 195.453
Low 194.625 195.05 194.675 193.55
High 196.675 196.875 196.35 196.625

Top 36 Battle

On Friday, Washington secured a spot in the Top 36 and Rutgers posted a mark better than the max mark that can be achieved by all but Pitt.  Pitt can surpass current #35 Washington and bump out Rutgers.  Pitt needs a 195.65 to make Regionals and could rise to #35 with a 195.875.

  35 36 37
  Washington Rutgers Pitt
NQS 195.420 195.3975 195.372
Max NQS     195.475
Min NQS     195.33
Low 193.575 193.6 194.65
High 196.575 196.55 196.4

The NQS is the National Qualifying Score, calculated by taking up to five of the team's lowest home scores, adding all the away scores, removing the high and low from that set, and averaging the rest.  The Max NQS is the highest the NQS can be, and the Min is the lowest.  The Low is the lowest score that is currently being dropped, while the High is score currently the highest score that is being dropped.  Scoring below or above these scores is how the Min RQS and Max RQS are calculated.  Note that some teams have more than five home scores and the lowest five are taken, before the new High score is determined.      

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