2013 NCAA SeasonMar 8, 2013 by Anne Phillips
Justin Spring Revolutionizing Men's NCAA Gymnastics
Justin Spring Revolutionizing Men's NCAA Gymnastics
Illinois head coach and 2008 Olympic medalist Justin Spring has plans to revolutionize NCAA men's gymnastics. He'll be testing out a new meet format in their home meet tonight with Minnesota. The plan is designed to make men's NCAA competitions more fan-friendly and marketable.
Justing Spring explains how it will all work, and his inspiration for the new system:
THE MEET
The defending national champion and sixth-ranked Fighting Illini men's gymnastics team will host the first match play event in NCAA gymnastics history this Friday at 7 p.m. CT at Huff Hall. Illinois will take on No. 7 Minnesota, competing under Illinois head coach Justin Spring's revolutionary format, which features match play scoring on each apparatus. Big Ten Network will air the competition on Monday, March 11 at 7 p.m. CT.
Justing Spring explains how it will all work, and his inspiration for the new system:
THE MEET
The defending national champion and sixth-ranked Fighting Illini men's gymnastics team will host the first match play event in NCAA gymnastics history this Friday at 7 p.m. CT at Huff Hall. Illinois will take on No. 7 Minnesota, competing under Illinois head coach Justin Spring's revolutionary format, which features match play scoring on each apparatus. Big Ten Network will air the competition on Monday, March 11 at 7 p.m. CT.
EXPERIMENTAL MATCH PLAY - HOW IT WORKS
The meet will feature head-to-head matchups on each event with no predetermined lineups, allowing coaches to select the order of competitors as the meet progresses. The competition will start on floor and continue through the Olympic order of events with five one-on-one matchups per apparatus. Each winner of a head-to-head contest (based on traditional performance score) receives one point for his team. If both gymnasts tie in a head-to-head matchup, both athletes receive one point. The team with the most individual points at the end of the night wins the dual contest. The judges will not reveal the traditional scores to the audience and, instead, will only reveal each head-to-head winner.
The meet will feature head-to-head matchups on each event with no predetermined lineups, allowing coaches to select the order of competitors as the meet progresses. The competition will start on floor and continue through the Olympic order of events with five one-on-one matchups per apparatus. Each winner of a head-to-head contest (based on traditional performance score) receives one point for his team. If both gymnasts tie in a head-to-head matchup, both athletes receive one point. The team with the most individual points at the end of the night wins the dual contest. The judges will not reveal the traditional scores to the audience and, instead, will only reveal each head-to-head winner.
The competition will start with a coin toss to determine which team performs first. After the first matchup, the team with the fewest points always goes last. If the teams are tied, the team that was leading prior to the tie performs last.
If the teams tie at the end of the night, the meet will be decided in a shootout, which will consist of five gymnasts from each team performing standing back tucks. The team that sticks the most back tucks wins the contest. If the teams are still tied after back tucks, the gymnasts will perform a round of back pikes, followed by a round of back fulls until one team wins.
Read more on fightingillini.com
Personally, I think this is a fantastic idea! What do you think? Would you perfer to watch men's NCAA gymnastics in this format?