Scoring an A Meet -- A Quick Tutorial

For those new to NVSL A Meet swimming, the scoring at an A meet is relatively simple.  Each event is worth nine points -- five for first, three for second, and one for third.  Each individual stroke totals 90 points -- so all freestyle events add up to 90 points total.  That means there are 360 points in the individual events (that is 90 points times the four events -- free, back, breaststroke, and fly).

There are twelve relays.  The winning team scores five points per relay, while the loser of the relay scores 0.  A sweep of the relays -- I've never seen it happen -- would be a 60-0 win.  A split (such as on Saturday) means each team wins six relays, so the relay scores were tied at 30 to 30.

Thus, there are 420 points generally scored in a swim meet.  Week one's Gator A meet only had 419 points, because four swimmers DQ'd in the same event, leaving only a first place and a second place finisher.  There was no third place finisher.

So that means 211 points are needed to win the meet.  There can be 210-210 ties.  It happens, although there have not been any in the 102 NVSL A meets so far this season.

To get to 211, every point counts -- which is why cheering on a Gator swimmer locked in a close battle for third place is more important than cheering for an MVPer who is cruising to an easy win.  A 6-3 victory adds up quicker than a 5-4 win.

(Editor's Note: Thanks, Blogger Obvious!)

And, that also means that if the other team cruises to an easy win in an event, taking second and third place to limit the damage to 4-5 is very important.  A sweep, which doesn't happen often in A meets, is special because of the 9-0 boost it provides the team.