The season is in full swing for the LSU gymnastics team.
The Tigers, coming off their highest score of the season Friday night, checked in at No. 20 in the initial Regional Qualifying Score rankings.
LSU’s RQS average is 194. 825. Six of the Southeastern Conference’s seven gymnastics teams are ranked in the top 25.
Florida tops the charts, leading the country with an RQS average of 197.055. Georgia is fourth, Alabama came in at No. 5, Arkansas checked in at No. 15 and Auburn is No. 18.
RQS determines the seedings and pairing of teams for the NCAA tournament.
The scoring system is not released until each team has competed in at least three home meets and three road meets.
As teams get more scores later in the season, lower scores begin to be dropped. The average at the end of the season will be each team’s top three home meets and top three road meets. The highest score — no matter home or away — will then be dropped from those six.
The average of the five kept scores will then determine placement for each of the six NCAA regional meets, which host the 36-team field. The top two teams in each regional meet will advance to the NCAA Championships.
Once the rankings are final, the regional meet placement is done in a snake-like fashion.
Teams ranked Nos. 1-6 will hold the top seed in their respective regional. It will then swing back, where No. 7 will be placed in a regional with No. 6, No. 8 in No. 5’s regional, No. 9 in No. 4’s, and so on until the field is completed with six teams placed in each of the six regionals.
If the tournament were to start today, LSU would be placed in a regional as the fourth seed with Alabama, Michigan, Ohio State, San Jose State and Maryland.
 
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Contact Rob Landry at [email protected]