Third place in the regional is exceptional, and outperformed our seed, knocking off #19 GW and #14 Oregon State.
To advance to nationals, we needed a perfect day (like our season high 196.800) and we needed LSU or Nebraska to have an off day. But unfortunately, Nebraska had their best meet of the season by far, and leaving us with little chance to advance.
Very good season by the Pack. A huge step in the right direction. From out of the NCAA for two years, to #20, is a huge leap. The next step is to get in that top 18, to get a protected seed in the NCAA, and they to hit on our routines in the regionals. For the first time in a while, it really looks like nationals is a reasonable goal again.
For what it's worth, of the top 12 teams, only in the 6-7-18 region did a team advance that wasn't supposed to. #18 Georgia topped #7 Michigan.
However, it's also worth noting that our season high score of 196.800 would have advanced over #8 Washington (196.275), #9 California (196.725), #18 Georgia (196.500) and #10 Arkansas (196.775)
Of course, that means that we have to put it all together on regional day, but it's reassuring to see that we have a team capable of making nationals. We just ended up in a region with two stud teams. Nebraska's second place finish was far and away the best second place finish in the nation. (it was the fifth best in the nation). LSU was #3.