Tracking Olympic Prospects as LA 7s Approaches
Tracking Olympic Prospects as LA 7s Approaches
Who will garner automatic Olympic qualification this Sevens World Series season?
Much remains on the line after the first three men's tournaments and the first two women's tournaments, but the picture for the women is much, much clearer than it is for the men.
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Top Three Among Women Already Decided?
New Zealand, Australia, and USA have been top three in both of the first two events, and as these teams look ahead to Hamilton and Sydney will get past the halfway mark of the seven-tournament season and we might well see these three still in the top three.
Certainly Australia and New Zealand (1st and 2nd in Dubai, then 2nd and 1st in Cape Town) are in a dominant position. We looked at the last three full seasons in the World Series to track the points earned per round for the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th teams in each of those seasons. We averaged that out and extrapolated to what we might expect for 1st through 4th in a seven-tournament season.
What we came up with was 131 points for 1st, 120 for 2nd, 106 for 3rd, and 87 for 4th. What that shows us is that there is often a big drop between 3rd and 4th. In 2018 the drop was really between 2nd and 3rd. Even so, after 28.6% of the season gone, New Zealand and Australia are already 29% of the way to that 1st-place total and 31.7% of the way toward that 2nd-place total.
Likely what will happen as these two teams will battle toward 1st and 2nd the rest of the Series.
Put another way, to get to 131 both of these teams would have to average 18.6 points—the equivalent of finishing 2nd three times and 1st twice in the remaining the five stops in the season. But to get to 3rd, they'd have to average a little better than fourth each stop, which many would say is eminently doable.
What About the USA?
The Eagles are 3rd with 32 points, which means they can reach that 131 point total if they win every remaining tournament. But if they hove between 3rd and 4th they should hit 106 which is likely to get them 3rd.
But slipping in one or even two tournaments could be a problem because right behind them are France, Ireland, and Fiji. All three of those teams could hit that 4th position with a consistent 4th/5th finish.
The Women's Series is More Predictable
It is much harder for a leading team to get undercut in a tournament in the Women's World Series. The reason for this that it's a 12-team tournament, with the top two from each of three pools, plus the two best third-place teams, going into the quarterfinals.
So, consider the scenario from the Men's LA 7s this past August. South Africa came into the tournament leading the Series and only really needing to make the Cup Quarterfinals to ensure they'd won the Series (winning one game on Day Two would have ensured it). But they lost their opening pool game to the USA, and because they also had to face New Zealand (whom they lost to as well), ended up in the lower bracket, allowing Australia to bypass them for the World Series championship.
But in the women's competition, a pool game upset for Australia or New Zealand, even dropping them to 1-2 in the pool, isn't the death knell. They would likely be able to hang on for a quarterfinal spot and potentially right the ship to win the tournament even after a bad Day One.
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That's why we're confident that New Zealand and Australia will keep playing well. Even if they trade 3rd and 4th the rest of the way, they'd end up with 114 and 112 points respectively. France would have to average 2nd place to catch them. Ireland would have to do better than that. Only the USA would have a realistic chance of catching those top two. And if, which is more likely, the Black Ferns Sevens and the Wallaroos win twice each, and maybe slip to 3rd twice, they would end up with 128 points each, which would be mathematically out of reach of everyone.
So keep an eye on who plays well in the LA Invitational, and who builds on that for Stop #3 in Hamilton. If someone like USA or France steal a tournament win in New Zealand then the chase is well and truly on. If the Eagles hold serve at 3rd or even 4th, then they tighten their grip on that Olympic qualifier spot.
Men's Race Up in the Air
The reason the men's race is so hard to predict is that normally by this time, 27% into the season, someone is clearly on top. In 2022 South Africa had won all of the first three tournaments and Argentina had finished 3rd twice and 2nd another time. They both stayed in the top four. In 2019 Fiji opened 5th, 1st, and 1st while the USA was second all three times. In 2018 South Africa was 1st, 3rd, then 2nd.
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But this year only one team, New Zealand, has stepped on the podium more than once, and the All Blacks Sevens rounded out that feat with a 9th-place showing in Hong Kong. While 2017-2019 saw thee top team or top two teams dominate and the #4 team be distantly behind (4th place was 71% of the 2017 winner's points total, 67.6% in 2018 and 79.5% in 2019), in 2022 everything kind of squished together.
The 4th-place team in 2022 had a points total that was 93.9% of the winner's total. In addition, 2022 saw more teams than ever make the podium despite the World Series dropping from 10 tournaments to nine. In 2017-2019, each season saw eight different teams make the podium. This year, in three tournaments, that number has already been achieved.
In addition, as we mentioned above, if a leading team is in a tough pool and drops a game, they could be out of the quarterfinals and beyond. All that is to say that co-leaders Samoa and South Africa are not safe. They could easily be turfed out of the Top 8 in Pool Play and someone else could make a run.
Our idea of seeing which teams were close to a hypothetical standard points total for 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th is out the window because of how close the opening weeks of the Series have been. (The system says Samoa and South Africa, tied for 1st, need to win every remaining tournaments to make the standard, which doesn't make sense at all.)
But if we look at the 3rd-place standard, 169 points, we might be in business. If every team targets 169 points as the threshold to getting that Olympic spot, Samoa and South Africa would want to average 4th place, New Zealand and USA would need to add a couple of 3rd-place finishes, and the five chasers in Fiji, Australia, France, Argentina, and Ireland would all need to essentially split the difference between 3rd and 4th.
What that all means is that if a team does well in Hamilton and Sydney, they could roll into Los Angeles ready to take control of the Series and the Olympic berth pursuit. Similarly, if it remains muddled throughout, we could see LA as the almighty battle for someone to emerge out of the crowd.
What If They're All Tied?
Consider, and this is not out of the realm of possibility:
Samoa takes 5th in Hamilton and makes the QFs but no further in Sydney. South Africa takes 6th in Hamilton and, likewise, makes the QFs in Sydney before bowing out. New Zealand takes 3rd at their home tournament but slips to 9th in Australia, while the USA makes the QFs in Hamilton and takes 4th in Sydney.
Meanwhile, Fiji is quarters and no further in Hamilton but is 2nd in Sydney, which is where Australia wins their home tournament a week after taking 9th. France is 2nd in Hamilton and 6th in Sydney; Argentina 4th and then 3rd; Ireland rebounds for a win in Hamilton but 5th in the Australian stop.
If something like that happens, Samoa comes into LA leading with 70 points, and the other eight teams all have 69. You may think we're not thinking straight but it's been that kind of season.
Everything—the LA 7s, the World Series, and a guaranteed berth in the 2024 Olympics could be decided at Dignity Health Sports Park February 25-26.