NCAA Gymnastics Regionals: A Comprehensive Guide

The NCAA Women's Gymnastics Championships is a thrilling competition that showcases the incredible athleticism and artistry of collegiate gymnasts. The road to the national championship involves a series of regional competitions, where teams and individuals battle for a chance to advance. This article provides a detailed explanation of the NCAA Gymnastics Regionals bracket, including the format, qualification process, and key elements that determine success.

Understanding the Basics

The NCAA postseason officially begins after the conference championships.Eighty-four NCAA member institutions sponsor National Collegiate Women’s Gymnastics teams and are eligible to compete in the National Championship. The championship provides for a field of 36 teams determined based on their national qualifying score. Four regionals consisting of 9 teams and approximately three all-around competitors (not on a qualifying team), and four individual specialists per event (not on a qualifying team) will be conducted at predetermined campus sites.

The NCAA Women’s Gymnastics Committee will select all judges (26 judges, a meet referee, and an alternate). The NCAA national office will provide the list of judges assigned to the championships. The meet referee will be selected first and be based on experience, recommendations from coaches and regional chairs, and approval by the committee. The referee can’t serve more than two consecutive years. The nationals meet referee will rotate regionals with each serving a two-year term.

Qualification for Regionals

The top 36 teams based on National Qualifying Score (NQS) qualify to regionals. The top 16 are seeded while No. 17-36 are placed geographically.

National Qualifying Score (NQS)

NQS is the metric used to rank teams and determine qualification for regionals. To start the season, rankings are based on team score average until approximately the eighth week of the 15-week season. After, rankings are determined by National Qualifying Score (NQS), formerly known as Regional Qualifying Score (RQS). NQS is determined by taking a team’s top six scores-where at least three must be from away meets-dropping the highest score and averaging the remaining five.

Seeding and Placement

For placement, teams ranked Nos. 1/8/9/16 are seeded into one regional, Nos. 2/7/10/15 are in another, Nos. 3/6/11/14 in the third, and Nos. 4/5/12/13 in the final regional. If there are host conflicts based on how teams finish the regular season, “the lowest seeded host in the group will be exchanged with a non-host that holds a spot not greater or less than two seeded positions (and preferably one position) when possible,” according to NCAA postseason rules. However, in 2019, Oregon State had to be shifted three positions due to conflicts in the first two adjusted scenarios. If a team declines its spot at regionals, the next-highest-ranked team based on NQS will be selected. Also, any of the 81 teams is eligible to qualify to compete at NCAA regionals.

Individual Qualifiers

The top 12 all-arounders and top 16 individual event specialists on each event, who are not on a top 28 qualifying team, make it to regionals. Individuals from teams competing in round one are included in the list of individual qualifiers in case their team doesn’t advance out of round one. No alternates are named for regionals or nationals for individual qualifiers. These individuals are placed at a regional competition geographically. To determine the session in which they compete, the NCAA outlined the following, confusing, parameters: “To ensure the top-seeded teams have the least number of individuals competing with them, the committee will pair the highest-ranked all-arounder at the site with the lowest-seeded team (or lowest NQS team at the site first, then proceed to the seeded teams), the next highest all-arounder with the next lowest-seeded team, etc. All individual competitors will compete and qualify for nationals out of the Friday round two sessions. Results will be combined over the two sessions to determine the top finisher not on a qualifying team in the all around and on each event.

Regional Competition Format

Regionals is a four-day competition, including one rest day.

Round One: Play-In Meet

Day one features a dual meet between the two “play-in” teams with the winner advancing to compete in the second session on day two. As for teams slated to compete in round one of regionals, technically any unseeded team could be tabbed to compete-but it typically works out where teams ranked Nos. 29 to 36 are distributed to each of the four regionals. However, there was controversy in 2021 when No. 26 N.C. State was selected to compete in round one while No. 29 Kent State skipped straight to day two.

Round Two: Quad Meets

In each of the two-day two sessions, the top two teams will advance to the regional final on where the top two teams from that quad meet advance to NCAA semifinals in two weeks’ time. Seven of the eight teams that compete in round two essentially have a round one bye with round one serving as the equivalent of basketball’s play-in games.

Read also: Crafting Your NCAA Profile

Round Three: Regional Final

The top two teams from each of the two round-two sessions advance to the regional final. The top two teams from the regional final then advance to the NCAA National Semifinals.

Advancing to Nationals

Team Qualification

At the national championships, semifinal team, all-around competition, and individual event specialist finals will be conducted in two sessions. The team championship will be awarded to the team with the highest cumulative team score, with five scores counting per event.

Individual Qualification

All individual competitors compete and qualify for nationals out of the two round two sessions at regionals. Results are combined over the two sessions to determine the top finisher not on a qualifying team in the all-around and on each event. This results in four all-arounders and four individuals on each event qualifying to compete at the national championships. Individual national titles for the four events and the all-around are awarded based on the results of the two semifinal competitions. To determine winners, results from the two sessions are combined and those with the highest scores are crowned the national champions.

All-American Status

All-American status is determined by taking the top four, with ties, on each event and the all-around from each session at the NCAA national championships for the first team and fifth through eighth from each session for the second team.

Tie-Breaking Procedures

Ties aren’t broken for the team or individual national titles, but they are broken for pretty much everything else during the NCAA gymnastics championships. If the two regional round one teams tie at the end of the competition, it will be broken by counting all six scores per event instead of dropping the lowest score. If a tie still exists, the top and bottom scores for each event are thrown out and the remaining four are added to get a full team score. Any ties in the individual all-around are broken by looking at the highest single event score, then the next highest and so forth until the tie is broken. If there is still a tie, all four judges’ scores will be counted and averaged for all four events. For individual event ties, all four judges’ scores will be counted and averaged. If a tie still exists, the head judge’s score will be the tie breaker. Perhaps the most famous tie during the postseason came in 2014 when both Florida and Oklahoma tied for the national team title with scores of 198.175. It was the Sooners’ first national title in program history and the Gators’ second of an eventual three in a row.

Judging and Scoring

Each routine on bars, beam, and floor starts with a base start value of 9.4 and builds up to a 10.0 through various skill connections, bonus, and difficulty. On vault, each skill is worth a certain value based on its entry style and flight element. In the team competition, up to six gymnasts are allowed to compete on each event with the five best scores counting toward the event total. Each event total is then added together for the final team score. In the postseason, teams will be aiming to score at least a 49 on each event with scores of 49.500 or higher considered excellent. While judges use the same Code of Points during regular and postseason competition, the number of judges does change: During the regular season, two judges score routines on each event and those two scores are averaged for the gymnast’s final score. At regionals, four judges score each routine with the high and low scores dropped and the middle two averaged. At nationals, six judges score each routine with the high and low dropped and the middle four averaged. Common deductions include uncontrolled landings (from half a tenth to up to three tenths depending on the size of the step or hop), missed handstands (must be within 10 degrees of vertical to avoid deduction), and falls (an automatic half point off).

Key Strategies

There’s no defense in college gymnastics, so the offensive game is crucial. Coaches must submit all lineups (i.e., which gymnasts will be competing and the order in which they’ll be competing) prior to the start of the rotation. Judges are typically reluctant to give really high scores early in the rotation, preferring to save the best scores for last (there have been exactly two lead-off 10s in college gymnastics history, from UCLA’s Grace Glenn on beam in 2020 and Michigan’s Reyna Guggino on vault earlier this year). Because scores tend to rise as the rotation progresses, coaches want a consistent and reliably high-scoring gymnast in the lead-off position to set a confident tone for the rest of the lineup and provide a strong starting score for the judges to build upon. Typically the gymnast with the highest scoring potential anchors the lineup.

Conference Breakdown and Teams to Watch

In the expanded B1G era, we did damn well as a conference. The SEC remains a perennial powerhouse and qualified all nine of their programs, but the Big Ten grabbed 11 slots: Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State, Maryland, Michigan, UCLA, Minnesota, Nebraska, Illinois, Iowa, and Rutgers. Not bad!

Big Ten Teams

Michigan State: Ranked #8, faces Kentucky, Ohio State, and Penn State.
Ohio State: Competes in the same pod as Michigan State and Kentucky.
Penn State: Hosting the meet, giving them an advantage.
Maryland: Competing in the first-round play-in meet against West Virginia.
Michigan: Faces LSU and Arkansas in their pod.
UCLA: Led by Jordan Chiles, a strong contender to advance.
Minnesota: Seeded #12, led by Mya Hooten.
Nebraska: In a tough pod with Oklahoma and Auburn.
Illinois: Competing in the play-in meet against UC Davis.
Iowa: Faces Cal, Alabama, and North Carolina.
Rutgers: Takes on Clemson in the play-in meet.

Other Notable Teams

Kentucky: A very good squad that could challenge Michigan State.
LSU: Reigning champions.
Arkansas: Led by Olympic gold medalist Josceyln Roberson.
Oklahoma: Has won the NCAA title six times since 2014.
Auburn: A very good squad.
Cal: Seeded #6.
Alabama: Seeded #11.

Schedule and Where to Watch

The competition spans several days, with meets on ESPN+. Check College Gym News for a detailed schedule and streaming links. Every round of the gymnastics postseason will be streamed or broadcast on TV with regionals appearing on ESPN+, national semifinals on ESPN2, and the team final on ABC. Find the schedule below or visit CollegeGymNews.com/Schedule for video and live score links, previews, and more information. The postseason begins after conference championship weekend, starting with three days of competition for NCAA regionals from April 3 -7.

The Future of NCAA Gymnastics Regionals

There has been discussion about adopting a March Madness-style tournament with 1-on-1 matchups. The concern is that gymnastics is harder on the body than basketball, so top teams should compete less. One proposal is to expand regionals to a week, with 12 teams at each of the four regional sites. This would allow for multiple rounds of 1-on-1 matchups. Another idea is to keep nine teams at each regional and include a play-in round.

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