NATIONAL JUNIOR WATER SKI TEAM Qualifications & Procedures (Revised January 2024) 

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The team will be announced in January of each year.

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Qualifications:

To be eligible for the National Junior Water Ski Team, a skier must: 

1. be a U.S. Citizen, 

2. be a member of USA Water Ski in good standing, 

3. competed in the Boys 3, Boys 4, Boys 5, Girls 3, Girls 4 or Girls 5 division in at least (3) separate Class “C” or higher tournaments in the previous ski year, excluding those skiers who have aged up into M1/W1. 

Selection Procedures: 

1. Juniors with an “open” rating in overall or in any single event will automatically be selected to the team.

2. Using the AWSA National Rankings List, any skiers with “open” ratings who were automatically selected will be purged, and then the top 2 overall skiers for both the previous ski year and the last twelve months in each division listed above will be selected to the National Junior Team.

3. If a skier sets a benchmark overall or single event score, regardless of the age division criteria above, and does not otherwise make the team, they will be selected.

4. The National Junior Development Committee may choose up to two skiers for discretionary selection.

5. Members of the National Junior Team are eligible to be selected for their Region’s All-Star Team. 

 

Regional Recognitions

 

These awards will be announced at Regionals each year.

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• First time Regional Tournament participants

 

• Regional Tournament placement 

            1st-5th and Overall in each division

 

• Most Improved 

            All divisions and events will be recognized.  A skier’s current year NOPS score (as of the Wednesday before regionals) will be compared to his/her previous year’s score.

 

 

Regional Teams

 

• SCR All Star Team (6 members + plus one alternate)

The team will consist of six members and one alternate. The team’s combined performance at the National Tournament will be compared to the teams from the other regions.  

            To be eligible, an athlete must:

• Be a U.S. citizen

• Be a member of USA Water Ski and in good standing

• Be a current skier in Boys 2-5 or Girls 2-5

• Be committed to attending and skiing in the Nationals

The skiers NOPS points will be used for the selection process.  Skiers will be chosen based on their regional seeding* as 60% and their regional performances as 40 percent.  The strongest three-event athletes will be chosen first, followed by two event athletes and then single event athletes.  Each team will be comprised of Boys and Girls 2,3,4,5. The 6 member team may have no more than two team members from the same division, with gender distribution at either 3/3 or 4/2.  Members of the National Junior Team and members of the any other national or international teams are now eligible (revised Feb. 2020).  The alternate can be from any eligible division.                                

 

 

•    SCR Select Team (20 members)

Twenty juniors from the South Central Region will be recognized for their commitment and achievement during the season.  The team will               consist of no more that 20 members. The makeup of the team will be:

            No more than (10) juniors (current year ski age 11 and under) 

            No more than (10) juniors (current year ski age 12 and over) 

Juniors who meet the criteria but will age into the Men’s 1/ Women’s 1 division after Nationals will be recognized.  (They will not count as one of the 10). 

 

            Eligibility Criteria:

1. They will be a current junior skier, who resides in the South Central region.

2. The skier MUST attend the current year’s JD tournament and Regionals (injuries will be handled on a case by case basis)

            Calculation process

The average of the Overall NOPS* scores of the top two skiers in each division will serve as the standard for each division. Each skier will be assigned an adjusted score that is the difference of their score and their division’s average.

            Example:  

            Skier A (the top place Overall NOPS skier) has a NOPS score of 2200.  

            Skier B (the second place Overall NOPS skier) has a NOPS score of 2030. 

            Skier C (the third highest NOPS skier) has an Overall NOPS score of 1980.

The top two scores are averaged together for a division average of 2115 (all skiers are now adjusted from that average).

            Skier A’s adjusted score becomes +85

            Skier B’s adjusted score becomes -85

            Skier C’s adjusted score becomes -135 

     

This process continues for all skiers in each division and provides a way to compare scores across divisions and genders which is not possible using straight NOPS numbers.   

             

            Selection process:

1.  The top two eligible skiers from each division are automatically selected to the team. 

2.  The remaining spots will be filled according to the adjusted score list until all ten spots are full for each team (under 12 team and 12+ team)

4.  If there are not 20 skiers that meet the eligibility criteria, the selection committee reserves the right to fill the spots at their discretion.

 

 

*Note- the Overall NOPS score used will be the skier’s score as of the Wednesday before the Regional Tournament.  A skier’s NOPS score can be found at http://www.usawaterski.org/pages/divisions/3event/main.asp under the Ranking List tab.  To view NOPS, hover over a skier’s ranking score.  If a skier does not have an overall NOPS score because they only ski one or two events, then the overall score will be the sum of NOPs points for each event they ski.