Boys At Large Breakdown (Girls HERE)
by Dennis Young
Against qualified teams: 7 points behind Bozeman at Bob Firman
In the rankings: preseason #9, dropped out after week one.
Quick take: Their case is mostly based on being very close to the #2 Northwest team, Bozeman. But their lack of wins against qualified teams will almost certainly rule them out.
NXN Heartland
The Heartland could well sneak up on us at the best region in the country. Hopkins is a legitimate national title contender, and if Edina and Wayzata make it, they'll have pulled off the unusual feat of qualifying for NXN without qualifying for their state championship meet.
Auto qualifiers
1 Hopkins 71
2 Edina 135
At-large candidates
3 Wayzata 139
Against qualified teams: One point behind Edina at their region meet, beat potential Southeast qualifier Lake Braddock 142-227 at Roy Griak
In the rankings: Been on the bubble for the last month.
Quick take: Their chances are very, very good. In three matchups against Edina, they've finished a combined nine points behind them. While one win would be good, that helps.
Against qualified teams: Beat Edina 57-62 at their region meet, beat potential Southeast qualifier Lake Braddock 162-227 at Roy Griak
In the rankings: Bubble now, reached as high as #19
Quick take: Their case is mostly based on beating Wayzata all season, and Wayzata is a serious candidate for an at-large bid.
NXN Midwest
Auto qualifiers
1 Sandburg 120
2 Neuqua Valley 140
At-large candidates
3 Lyons 150
Against qualified teams: Beat Neuqua Valley 118-170 at the IL state meet, beat Neuqua Valley 67-97 at the Peoria Invitational
In the rankings: #13 now; unranked otherwise
Quick take: Lyons racked up several losses to non-qualifying teams York and Hinsdale Central, but saved their best for November, when they beat Neuqua twice and only finished ten points behind NV at the regional meet.
Against qualified teams: Beat South runner-up Southlake Carroll 48-78 at Chile Pepper
In the rankings: As high as #5; now #24
Quick take: Sixty points out of third place at a regional meet is an extremely hard case to make when there are eighteen teams vying for four at-large spots. And their narrow win over Southlake doesn't look as good in the light of November as it did in the light of early October. They're hoping for lots of third-place teams to have huge gaps behind second place on Saturday.
NXN South
With a 119-point gap between Carroll and runners-up Flower Mound, it's safe to assume that none of the four at-large berths to Portland will be coming from this region.
Auto qualifiers
1 The Woodlands
2 Southlake Carroll
NXN Southwest
Auto qualifiers
1 Mountain Vista 108
2 Timpanogos 109
At-large candidates
3 Lone Peak 109
Against qualified teams: Beat Bozeman at Bob Firman, tied Timpanogos at NXN Southwest
In the rankings: Bubble for much of the season
Quick take: If they get left home, it's harder to think of anyone who will be more motivated for track than Craik Evans, who was Lone Peak's sixth man that lost the tiebreaker to Timpanogos. The best bet, though, is that Lone Peak gets to go to Portland.
4 American Fork 121
Against qualified teams: Beat Lone Peak at Utah state meet
In the rankings: #12 in rankings that pre-date NXN SW
Quick take: The Southwest is one of the best regions in the country. But taking two teams from the region would mean that the other two at-large squads would have to get spread among eight more regions, a brutal calculus that probably doesn't help American Fork.
The following meets are on Saturday.
NXN Northeast
The top Jersey and Pennsylvania teams have conspired to make this region brutal to predict. Downingtown West beat Broughton, Christian Brothers Academy, Liverpool, Fayetteville-Manlius, Mt. Tabor, and St. Anthony's in that order at Manhattan, which should--conservatively--add up to at least three wins over qualifying teams. They also tuned up Don Bosco 52-114 at the Carlisle Invitational.
Bosco, though, has shown a totally different side in November, splitting championship meets with CBA and finishing less than ten points apart both times. With just the lone win over CBA, Bosco probably doesn't have the resume to get an at-large. But they are good enough to finish in the top two, and if they do, Downingtown West and CBA have very strong at-large candidacies, particularly West.
PREDICTED Auto qualifiers
1 Downingtown West
2 Christian Brothers Academy
PREDICTED At-large candidates
3 Don Bosco Prep
4 La Salle Academy
5 Pinkerton
NXN New York
Liverpool and FM beat Mt. Tabor at Manhattan, but that's about it for wins over out-of-New York qualifiers. Probably the likeliest situation leading to a New York at-large is Liverpool finishing a very close third behind FM and, say, East Aurora or St. Anthony's and getting credit for their Section 3 win over FM.
PREDICTED Auto qualifiers
1 Liverpool
2 East Aurora
PREDICTED At-large candidates
3 Fayetteville-Manlius
4 St. Anthony's
5 Xavier
NXN Southeast
With no teams ranked in the Flo50 top twenty, the committee would have to see things wildly differently than we do to put three in the nation's top twenty-two. Broughton and Mt. Tabor very much held their own at Manhattan, but 1) that was a 4k six weeks ago and 2) they're likely to be the top two teams on Saturday anyway. Should Trinity Prep break into the top two, Broughton beat possible qualifiers CBA, Liverpool, FM, and St. Anthony's at Manhattan, and Mt. Tabor beat St. Anthony's there. Trinity Prep did beat St. Anthony's at the flrunners.com Invitational, so all three of these teams are rooting for St. Anthony's at NXN NY on Saturday.
Dulaney, Lake Braddock, and Marietta all could crack the top two, but they lack the regular season credentials to boost an at-large candidacy.
PREDICTED Auto qualifiers
1 Broughton
2 Mt. Tabor
PREDICTED At-large candidates
3 Dulaney
4 Marietta
5 Lake Braddock
California State Meet
Welcome to the wild process of qualifying for NXN from the state of California, where you could win the biggest division in the biggest state in the country and get left at home. That's what happened to Great Oak last year, and it could happen to anyone thanks to the way teams qualify to Portland from Fresno. Nike "power merges" "less than 20 top teams" from the state meet--a relatively fair way to do things considering the size of other regional championships--and the teams qualify for NXN in that order, with the top two going automatically and the next two on the table for at-large bids. Great Oak is so good this year that it shouldn't matter, but Dana Hills, Jesuit, Brea Olinda, and Davis are all at the mercies of the power merge. The big three--Great Oak, Dana Hills, and Jesuit--went 81, 117, 135, respectively, at the Clovis Invite, where they destroyed Southlake Carroll.
If Great Oak finishes out of the top two in the power merge, their resume is much stronger than last year's team's. They beat NXN qualifers Bozeman by 142 points at Bob Firman, where they finished just two points behind qualifier Timpanogos and sixty-six ahead of likely at-large squad Lone Peak. If it's Dana Hills or Jesuit at #3, they'll have to rely on a strong state meet showing, as other than their win over Carroll, they've mostly raced against California teams.
PREDICTED Auto qualifiers
1 Great Oak
2 Dana Hills
PREDICTED At-large candidates
3 Jesuit
4 Brea Olinda
5 Davis
AT-LARGE PREDICTIONS:
1. Wayzata
2. Lone Peak
3. California team #3
4. If the third Northeast team is Downingtown West or CBA and they're close to second place, the NE team. Otherwise, Lyons