Varsity 3A at Palatine
The busiest dance weekend of the season so far included a showdown at Palatine’s annual contest on Saturday 1/11/14. The schedule was a bit more compact than in years past, and that’s no surprise considering another huge contest was going on at Andrew. But teams still circle the January Palatine date on their calendars as “the big one,” and in the current IHSA calendar, it was a great chance to see where the teams stood just a couple weeks before sectionals.
The 31 routines in varsity 3A danced to an average score of 85.34, considerably higher than what we saw at Sears Centre the week before (although the mix of teams was very different). But just like last week, the middle score (“median”) came in a bit higher than the average: at 86.57, we can say that the overall 3A field tilted more towards the higher scores than the lower ones.
If we dump the decimals and round each score, the most common whole-number score was an impressive 90 (5 routines), and two more came in at 92 (these finished 1st and 2nd overall). As you might expect at this point of the season, many more routines are finishing with a higher score than a lower one. Of 31 routines the lowest score was a 71.87, while the top 15 add did better than an 87!
Six of the routines were of the jazz / open dance type, and they ranged from Lake Park’s 92.33 (the winner) down to a solid 83.00, with an average of 87.62. Kick’s lone routine (Fremd) scored an impressive 91.77. Twelve teams performed a pom routine, averaging at 84.96 and ranging from 90.23 to 71.87. Judges saw seven lyrical dances (with a high of 90.10 and a low of 83.33) that averaged at 86.67. Hip hop routines appeared five times, scored an 80.37 average, and ranged from 89.90 to 72.50.
All of this means that each unofficial category was pretty well-represented at Palatine in varsity 3A, with the exception of just a single kick routine and about 39% being pom routines. The variety of dances also shows up when looking at the top seven, where each category had a routine and no category appeared more than twice. In other words, by the time you get down to 8th place, all styles of dance were already represented. Even the lowest average score of a particular category (hip hop, 80.37) isn’t too far off of the overall 3A average (85.34).
It’s hard to tell if the lost practices due to school closings affected anyone in terms of performance (but we’re pretty sure it affected everyone in terms of preparation). Five of the Palatine teams danced at Sears last week and the week-to-week change was all over the map: Lake Park’s jazz stayed at a 92.3, Downers Grove South (open dance “gold”) and Waubonsie Valley (lyrical) slipped a little (-2 and -5.5 respectively), but Conant’s pom picked up 10.5 points, St. Charles East’s pom added 10.6 points, and Palatine’s pom improved by 5.
Our graphic shows how the double-routine teams did versus the single-routine teams, but what’s really impressive is Fremd’s accomplishment of putting both of theirs in the top 4, a feat similar to what they did at their contest on November 23. Seven different combos of dance styles appeared at Palatine, but the most common was a pom + lyrical combination brought by St. Charles North, St. Charles East, South Elgin, and Waubonsie Valley. HD Jacobs, besides leading the hip hop routines, was the highest-scoring team with a single routine (89.90).