We often hear commentators and coaches talk about the value of having experienced upperclassmen in lineups. Upperclassmen often bring leadership and stability to the team, but do lineups with more juniors and seniors actually score higher than those with more underclassmen? On a small scale, that case can certainly be made. Last year’s more experienced Minnesota team performed far better than this season’s younger roster based on the current rankings. However, when you look at the big picture, is there actually a correlation?
Since the standings are still in flux for the 2023 season, the top 36 teams based on the 2022 regular season rankings were used in this analysis. Lineups often change throughout the season, so the MVP feature on Road to Nationals was used to identify which athletes competed the most on each event throughout the 2022 season, and the top six were used on each event to mimic the lineup we likely saw most during the year. An experience rating was then calculated by adding up the years of experience in the lineup with freshmen garnering one experience point, fifth-years getting five points, etc.
Based on this metric, Minnesota and Georgia were the most experienced teams with 85 experience points while Utah State and Western Michigan…
