25 Years of Regionals NQS Requirements

Plotting the Data

For this analysis, I collected the top 36 NQSs at the end of the regular season every year between 1999 and 2023 and put it into a single spreadsheet. That data is available to view as a Google Sheets document for those who are curious.

A few notes on NQS scores:

• Prior to 2019, the NQS (National Qualifying Score) was referred to as RQS (Regional Qualifying Score), but the formula for NQS and RQS is the same so there is no discrepancy in how those numbers are calculated.

• Conference championships are considered part of the regular season for NQS purposes.

• In 2020, the season was shortened because of Covid; teams completed 10 instead of 12 weeks during the regular season but NQSs were still calculated. In 2021, in anticipation of potentially canceled meets because of Covid outbreaks, NQS calculations used only the top four scores instead of the usual top six scores in their calculations. The data for 2020 and 2021 was largely consistent with what we saw in prior and subsequent years, so for the sake of continuity of my timeline, I included both 2020 and 2021 in my data.

I then put the data into a single scatter plot to get a visual idea of any changes or trends:

Looking at this data, the increase over the years is obvious. We can see an increase of about a point in the top ranks and more than two points for teams ranked in the 30s. Looking more specifically, it looks like there is some consistency within groups of years so scores are more “clumped” into similar ranges. And there is a significant increase in the middle ranks in 2021 and the lowest 10 ranks in 2022 and 2023.

Scoring Consistency Across Years

We can look at those “clumps” of years from a more statistically rigorous perspective using t-tests and ANOVA (or analysis of variance). T-tests allow us to compare two years directly and see whether they’re similar enough to have been from the same data set, or more specifically for our purposes whether the those two years could be considered equally scored. ANOVA tests allow us to compare groups of years to see if there is consistency across all those years. The tests will give us a number between 0 and 1 that gives us the probability (or p-value) of whether the two are likely to be consistent. One of the most commonly used baselines in statistics is a 95 percent confidence interval, which means that the number we’re going to be looking at is 0.05 and whether p-values are above or below that value.

First, I looked at t-tests between each year to get an idea of which groups of years I should start looking into:

Again, higher numbers indicate a higher likelihood that the scoring system was consistent between those two years. I went through and highlighted groups of years that seem to have similar systems. It looks like 1999 and 2000 were fairly similar, then things started getting higher in 2001 and 2002, got significantly higher in 2003 and 2004 (the fabled year of inflated scoring), then got much tighter in in 2005, even tighter in 2006, then started to move back into 2001-02 levels and stayed that way until 2013-ish, then most of the twenty-teens saw consistent scoring and then things started getting even higher in 2021, 2022 and 2023.

Let’s look at those groups individually.

1999-2007

First, let’s tackle 1999 through 2007. It was kind of a mess. There wasn’t really any consistency across this period for more than a year or two, and the scores didn’t get consistently higher year over year across the entire period.

Year	Average	Max	Min	Variance
1999	195.112	197.444	193.513	1.041
2000	195.356	197.255	194.155	0.772
2001	195.883	197.640	194.610	0.778
2002	195.677	197.240	194.575	0.666
2003	196.330	197.980	195.285	0.569
2004	196.680	198.055	195.675	0.464
2005	195.507	197.320	194.135	0.799
2006	195.181	197.305	193.210	1.269
2007	195.595	197.435	193.985	1.011

I won’t pretend to be a gymnastics historian and don’t remember much from the early Aughts as far as overall gymnastics goes because I was a teenager (I was born in 1987 so I would’ve been 12 at the turn of the Millennium), gymnastics coverage wasn’t great (to say the least) and the internet was not nearly as straightforward for collecting information as it is today so I remember very little outside of Utah’s team and performance. But from my understanding, the period in the late 90s and early Aughts was the point where college gymnastics was starting to really find itself as a sport and scores were starting to get closer to where we are now.

We went from Utah winning the title in 1983 with a team total of 184.650 and scores for other semifinalists ranging from 183.300 for Arizona State and 165.550 for Nebraska to 1995 with Utah winning with a 196.650 and scores ranging from 196.425 for Alabama/Michigan to 189.650 for West Virginia:

The mid-90s is when year-to-year increases among the lower half of teams competing at nationals started to narrow and all teams started to move into the 190s, and I think judges were having difficulty figuring out what they wanted college gymnastics scoring to look like moving forward and it took a few years for things to even out a bit. Once we hit around 2007 or so, there were clear patterns in scoring consistency for a few years at a time.

Year	Average	Difference
1999	195.112
2000	195.356	0.244 ^
2001	195.883	0.527 ^
2002	195.677	-0.206 v
2003	196.330	0.653 ^
2004	196.680	0.350 ^
2005	195.507	-1.172 v
2006	195.181	-0.326 v
2007	195.595	0.414 ^

Interestingly, the scoring system we saw in groups of these years (1999-2000, 2006; 2001-02, 05,07; 2003; 2004) generally coincide with a scoring system for a group of years later on in our analysis period. I will include these years with the later groups.

First I will add the scatterplots, ANOVA p-values and tables for each group of years, then I will do some analysis of the different periods.

1999-2000 and 2006

Scores generally got higher each year as we moved from 1999 to 2004, with 2003 and 2004 being the most statistically significant increase. After the score reckoning in 2004, 2005 saw lower scores and 2006 was even tighter, with scores moving back down to the 1999-2000 level before moving back up.

Year	Average	Max	Min	Variance
1999	195.112	197.444	193.513	1.041
2000	195.356	197.255	194.155	0.772
2006	195.181	197.305	193.210	1.269
Average	195.216	197.335	193.626	1.027

2001-02, 2005 and 2007-2012

Years	Average	Max	Min	Variance
2001	195.883	197.640	194.610	0.778
2002	195.677	197.240	194.575	0.666
2005	195.507	197.320	194.135	0.799
2007	195.595	197.435	193.985	1.011
2008	195.604	197.400	194.065	0.930
2009	195.758	197.255	194.625	0.617
2010	195.782	197.250	194.385	0.716
2011	195.662	197.190	194.145	0.656
2012	195.949	197.445	194.770	0.645
Average	195.703	197.317	194.366	0.758

2003 and 2013-2020

2004 is the year known among gymnastics fans as the year with the highest scoring that required a “come to Jesus” moment among judges. That started in 2003, which saw a measurable increase over the previous years but wasn’t quite as wild as 2004. Things moved back down to pre-2003 levels for about a decade, but started to rise back up to be consistent with 2003 levels (but not quite 2004 levels) starting in around 2013. Notably the p-value for 2003 and 2013-2020 is 0.906, which indicates scores were very consistent over this period in a way we haven’t seen before or since.

Year	Average	Max	Min	Variance
2003	196.330	197.980	195.285	0.569
2013	196.246	197.840	195.065	0.631
2014	196.317	197.895	195.160	0.644
2015	196.380	197.895	195.355	0.595
2016	196.401	197.920	195.385	0.494
2017	196.450	198.010	195.420	0.557
2018	196.441	197.995	195.520	0.429
2019	196.353	198.025	195.250	0.609
2020	196.515	198.080	195.420	0.475
Average	196.381	197.960	195.318	0.559

2004 and 2021

2004 is the year known among gymnastics fans as the year with the highest scoring that required a “come to Jesus” moment among judges. We saw 98 perfect 10s given, which is a record that still exists today despite the craziness of the last couple of years (2023 saw 84 10s and 2022 saw 71). The top team (UCLA) had an NQS above 198, a barrier we didn’t see passed again until 2017 (that level has been reached 9 times since then – one each in 2017, 2019, 2020 and three each in 2022 and 2023).

After 2004, scores moved back down significantly then increased back to 2003 levels between 2013 and 2020, then 2021 hit the same level we saw in 2004.

Year	Average	Max	Min	Variance
2004	196.680	198.055	195.675	0.464
2021	196.747	197.844	195.769	0.469
Average	196.713	198.000	195.722	0.466

2022 and 2023

2022 and 2023 saw scores get even higher than what we saw in 2004. There may have been fewer 10s, but NQSs were higher across the board, especially among the lower half of regionals teams.

Year	Average	Max	Min	Variance
2022	196.941	198.140	196.215	0.349
2023	197.092	198.375	196.285	0.365
Average	197.016	198.258	196.250	0.357

Comparing the Groups

I took the average NQS of each rank within a group (so the average of rank 1 for 1999, 2000, 2006, rank 2 for the same years, rank 3, etc), to see how the scoring among the ranks changed as we moved to different groups.

As we can see, the average NQS for the lower ranks increased for each group of years. However, the NQS for the top handful of ranks was the same for two groups. So either one team was significantly better than the rest of the teams within a group of years or one team was scored significantly better than the rest of the teams.

Period	Average	Max	Min	Variance	p-value
1999-2000, 2006	195.216	197.335	193.626	1.027	0.576
2001-02, 2005, 2007-12	195.703	197.317	194.3066	0.758	0.460
2003, 2013-20	196.381	197.970	195.354	0.547	0.906
2004 and 2021	196.713	198.000	195.722	0.466	0.680
2022-23	197.016	198.258	196.250	0.357	0.287

As expected, each group of years saw increasing NQS numbers across the board, with the average and minimum scores getting closer to the maximum scores. We also saw the variance decrease as the scores grew higher, which is to be expected as the lower scores get closer to the higher scores.

Rank Equivalencies

Next I wanted to look at what NQS would be needed to get a certain rank in each year.

For my first rank analysis, I looked at 2023’s ranks 8, 16, 24 and 36 then went backwards through 1999 to see how much things have increased rank-wise in the last quarter century.

Rank	NQS
8	197.720
16	197.100
24	196.710
36	196.285

2023’s rank 8 is a good indicator of how much scores at the top have risen in the last couple of years. The NQS required to hit rank 8 in 2023 (197.720) would put a team at rank 1 up until 2013. Even 2003 and 2004, the years of the inflated scoring, would still put the team at rank 2. A team with that NQS would be a 1 seed at regionals every year until 2021.

Some of the biggest increases in rank come in the bottom half of the NQS numbers for 2023.

Being the last spot (36th) would be the equivalent of a seeded spot up until 2012 (except 2003-04). The 24th ranked team would be seeded every year until 2020 (except 2004).

The largest increase in rank is the 24th team from 2023 (NQS 196.710) would move all the way up to second in 2006. That means 23 teams scored above a 196.710 in 2023 but only one scored above that in 2006.

I then chose 2010 as my second sample since it’s about halfway between my start and endpoints. The NQS requirements to get each of the following ranks were:

Rank	NQS
1	197.250
8	196.545
16	196.025
24	195.365

The top ranked team in 2010 (Alabama) scored a 197.250 NQS. That mark would result in a 1 seed (ranks 1-6) every year between 1999 and 2013 (except 2003-04), in 2016 and in 2018. It would put you as a 2 seed in 2014, 2015, 2017, 2019 and 2020. But by 2023, you would only be a 4 seed.

An NQS of 196.025 would net you rank 16 and a seeded spot at regionals in 2010 wouldn’t even get you into a play-in meet in 2022 or 2023.

And 2010’s rank 24 with an NQS of 195.365 would miss out on regionals in 2004 and every year after 2015 except 2019, where you would barely slide in at rank 34.

NQS Requirements

I looked at the difference in NQS requirements to make regionals (rank 36) every year compared to the 196.285 required to make regionals in 2023.

The differences vary between only 0.070 points lower in 2022 to 3.075 points lower in 2006. 2004 is higher than every year except 2021-22 with a difference of 0.610 points.

Next I looked at the difference in requirements to finish with the top NQS compared to the 198.375 required in 2023.

These numbers are much closer together with a maximum of only 1.185 points in 2011.

We saw the NQS for the top ranked team hit at least a 198.000 in six years; 2004, 2017, 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023.

The largest single-year increase came in 2003, when the top NQS jumped from 197.240 in 2002 to 197.980 in 2003. There was also a significant jump from 2012’s 197.445 (the last year the top NQS fell below 197.500) to 2013’s 197.840.