Data Deep Dive: New NQS Rules Applied to the 2020 Season

There’s breaking news in the college gym world: In 2021 the national qualifying score for teams will be calculated using the top four scores, with at least two from away meets. In previous years, the 36 teams qualifying to the postseason were determined by taking the top six scores, three of which from road meets, dropping the top score overall and averaging the rest.

There are two aspects to this change. First, the top score overall is no longer dropped. This will likely benefit teams who are well-known for having a home-scoring advantage, which is unsurprisingly a similar list to the teams who have historically been most likely to make nationals.

The second aspect to this change is that fewer scores will count overall. Given that the schedules that have so far been released are showing approximately three fewer meets (or about a quarter of the usual schedule) per team this season, this is a change that makes sense.

While the March 9 Road to Nationals team rankings ended up counting as the final 2020 season order, that doesn’t tell the whole story of the season. There were several teams who still had three or more opportunities to drop low scores from their NQS calculations that would have pushed them farther up the rankings. To illustrate this, we calculated each team’s “upside,” which is their season high score minus the lowest score that was counted in their final NQS. This tells us approximately how much opportunity the team would have had to increase their NQS if they performed at their top ability for the remainder of the season. Here are the Upside values for the top 45 teams at the end of the 2020 season:

Team NQS Season High Low NQS Score Upside
Oklahoma 198.080 198.450 197.675 0.775
Florida 197.940 198.375 197.800 0.575
UCLA 197.565 198.025 197.250 0.775
Utah 197.475 198.075 197.100 0.975
Michigan 197.420 197.950 197.075 0.875
LSU 197.285 197.875 197.000 0.875
Denver 197.170 197.425 196.925 0.500
Alabama 197.130 197.550 196.575 0.975
California 197.065 197.325 196.675 0.650
Minnesota 197.035 197.625 196.675 0.950
Washington 196.930 197.600 196.600 1.000
Georgia 196.900 197.425 196.300 1.125
Kentucky 196.690 197.275 196.600 0.675
Missouri 196.635 196.850 196.450 0.400
Oregon State 196.570 196.825 196.275 0.550
BYU 196.500 197.075 196.200 0.875
Arkansas 196.490 196.950 196.100 0.850
Auburn 196.490 196.700 196.275 0.425
Nebraska 196.440 197.100 195.925 1.175
Iowa State 196.400 196.800 196.225 0.575
Arizona State 196.365 196.875 195.600 1.275
Southern Utah 196.165 197.225 195.300 1.925
NC State 196.130 196.550 195.850 0.700
Illinois 196.000 196.550 195.775 0.775
Iowa 195.995 196.750 195.675 1.075
Stanford 195.990 196.725 195.550 1.175
Arizona 195.970 196.350 195.425 0.925
Maryland 195.940 196.975 195.325 1.650
Utah State 195.915 196.800 195.175 1.625
Penn State 195.860 196.375 195.150 1.225
West Virginia 195.820 196.425 195.325 1.100
Michigan State 195.795 196.550 195.300 1.250
Boise State 195.790 196.925 195.000 1.925
Ohio State 195.600 196.475 195.350 1.125
Pittsburgh 195.590 196.500 194.700 1.800
George Washington 195.420 195.900 194.900 1.000
North Carolina 195.395 196.325 194.675 1.650
Central Michigan 195.370 196.075 195.100 0.975
Northern Illinois 195.355 196.125 194.775 1.350
Kent State 195.280 196.050 194.950 1.100
New Hampshire 195.270 195.850 195.125 0.725
Western Michigan 195.245 196.075 194.950 1.125
Ball State 195.145 195.850 194.575 1.275
Rutgers 195.085 195.900 194.250 1.650
Eastern Michigan 194.850 195.425 194.650 0.775

Within the top 10 teams, the ones with the highest potential to make a move were Alabama, Utah and Minnesota, but the teams who really suffered the most from the abrupt truncation of the season were farther down the rankings: Boise State and Southern Utah tied with an upside of 1.925 apiece, followed by Pittsburgh, Maryland, Rutgers, North Carolina and Utah State.

Since the 2020 regular season ended two weeks early and the 2021 season will have approximately three fewer meets per team, we decided it would be a fun exercise to apply the new NQS rules to last year’s scores to see how it changed the standings. It might just give us a hint of how things might have shaken out if the regular season had been completed and teams had had more opportunities to drop low scores.

Team 2020 NQS 2020 Rank New NQS New Rank Change
Oklahoma 198.080 1 198.25 1 0
Florida 197.940 2 198.1 2 0
UCLA 197.565 3 197.73125 4 -1
Utah 197.475 4 197.7625 3 +1
Michigan 197.420 5 197.66875 5 0
LSU 197.285 6 197.56875 6 0
Denver 197.170 7 197.3375 7 0
Alabama 197.130 8 197.30625 9 -1
California 197.065 9 197.2125 11 -2
Minnesota 197.035 10 197.325 8 +2
Washington 196.930 11 197.2375 10 1
Georgia 196.900 12 197.1375 12 0
Kentucky 196.690 13 196.875 13 0
Missouri 196.635 14 196.78125 15 -1
Oregon State 196.570 15 196.6625 18 -3
BYU 196.500 16 196.75 16 0
Arkansas 196.490 17 196.6625 18 -1
Auburn 196.490 18 196.5625 21 -3
Nebraska 196.440 19 196.8 14 +5
Iowa State 196.400 20 196.5875 20 0
Arizona State 196.365 21 196.7 17 +4
Southern Utah 196.165 22 196.5375 22 0
NC State 196.130 23 196.275 28 -5
Illinois 196.000 24 196.23125 29 -5
Iowa 195.995 25 196.33125 26 -1
Stanford 195.990 26 196.2875 27 -1
Arizona 195.970 27 196.15625 30 -3
Maryland 195.940 28 196.4 23 +5
Utah State 195.915 29 196.36875 24 +5
Penn State 195.860 30 196.0625 33 -3
West Virginia 195.820 31 196.05 34 -3
Michigan State 195.795 32 196.0875 32 0
Boise State 195.790 33 196.35 25 +8
Ohio State 195.600 34 195.90625 36 -2
Pittsburgh 195.590 35 196.1 31 +4
George Washington 195.420 36 195.68125 38 -2
North Carolina 195.395 37 195.9625 35 +2
Central Michigan 195.370 38 195.6625 39 -1
Northern Illinois 195.355 39 195.7625 37 +2
Kent State 195.280 40 195.58125 41 -1
New Hampshire 195.270 41 195.4875 44 -3
Western Michigan 195.245 42 195.51875 43 -1
Ball State 195.145 43 195.56875 42 +1
Rutgers 195.085 44 195.63125 40 +4
Eastern Michigan 194.850 45 195.08125 46 -1

As expected, the new approach allowed the teams with the highest upside to drop scores that were holding them back and move up the rankings. Within the top 10, Utah moved past UCLA into third and Minnesota moved up from 10th to eighth place. However, the top movers overall were Boise State with a whopping eight places, and Maryland, Utah State and Nebraska with five places apiece.

So what does this mean? We’re not trying to rewrite 2020 history—there’s no guarantee that these teams would have scored high enough to make these moves in the standings before the end of the regular season. But they were the teams that arguably lost the most opportunity to improve by the premature ending to the season.

What does it tell us about 2021? This upcoming season is sure to be full of frustration and chaos, with last minute cancelations and unpredictable athlete absences, but with the change to no longer drop the high and to count fewer scores overall, there will be a lot more breathing room than normal. If your favorite team starts out with a couple of lower scores, these new NQS rules will allow plenty of opportunity to make up for it. Don’t panic!

READ THIS NEXT: Data Deep Dive: Freshman Class Rankings


Article by Jenna King

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