Recap Rundown: DCI World Championships Semifinals and Finals
The 2022 season ended in spectacular fashion with two incredible nights of performances on Friday and Saturday. Let's chat about it!
Hello and welcome to the final Recap Rundown of the 2022 DCI season! In this edition, we’re going to recap the last two days of the season - World Championships Semifinals and Finals. Feel free to follow along with this interactive dashboard powered by Google Data Studio. Here, you can find a number of tables and charts that break down the season’s scores by a number of metrics such as shows, corps, class, date, and even caption scores.
The 2022 season is complete and we have our champion for Drum Corps International’s milestone 50th anniversary year! Congratulations to the Blue Devils for their 20th World Championship and their ninth championship in the past 14 competitive seasons. They are truly on a remarkable run that doesn’t appear to be ending anytime soon. They ended the season with an impressive and although shy of the 99 we thought they might score, still ended the year on an impressive undefeated run.
First, let’s talk about a busy and eventful semifinals day. After grabbing the 25th and final semifinals spot in prelims on Thursday, Jersey Surf kicked off the day with their performance of “Meet Me in Atlantic City.” As we talked about after prelims, Surf has had an incredibly challenging yet successful season that culminated with their second straight top 25 finish. The corps ended the season with a final score of 73.875, and while they fell two points shy of surpassing their 2019 score, finished above 70 for a tenth season since the corps moved to World Class in 2009.
Next up were Guardians, kicking off four straight performances by Open Class corps in their first ever semifinals appearance. Though they fell a few points from their corps record setting score in Open Class Finals, they too can mark the 2022 season as a success and will begin to look forward to continuing their upward trajectory in 2023.
Spartans, Blue Devils B, and Gold continued the early afternoon run of performances by Open Class corps. Spartans, making their ninth consecutive finals appearance, dropped nine tenths from prelims, but still finished the season with a respectable 76.6. Meanwhile, Blue Devils B finished 22nd with a 78.375 and within half a point of 21st place for the second straight day.
The competitive grouping of Gold, Pacific Crest, and Genesis became an area of interest after the three corps were separated by less than six tenths in prelims. Ultimately, it was Genesis who unfortunately fell two spots to 21st place; and while this was a spot lower than their final placing in 2019, they can be proud of a successful season in which they set a new corps record for highest score with a 79.813 in prelims. As a result Gold and Pacific Crest each moved up a spot; Gold finished with their first ever top 20 placement, while Pacific Crest broke 80 for the first time in 2022 to finish with a 80.25.
After a brief intermission, the late afternoon/early evening block with nine corps kicked off with Santa Clara Vanguard Cadets. After being named the 2022 Open Class World Champions earlier in the week, they tied a figurative bow with a final performance that scored an 81.05, good for 18th place - the fifth placement of 18th or higher in the corps’ last six appearances at World Championships.
The Academy and Music City also became a two corps battle to watch heading into World Championships after Music City placed within half a point of their Arizona-based rivals at Allentown. Ultimately, it was The Academy who came on top at season’s end with a 82.2, less than half a point ahead. However, Music City can still count the 2022 season as an incredible success after setting new corps records for highest final placement and highest final score.
Madison Scouts finished in 15th after spending nearly the entire second half of the season in that spot. While some may consider this to be another disappointing year out of finals, the Scouts made huge strides this season, their first competitive season as an all-gender inclusive corps. They also improved two spots and over a point and a half from their final placement and score in 2019 to finish with a 83.725.
A very competitive 11th through 14th grouping in prelims carried over to semifinals and was one that everyone kept their eyes on throughout Friday. Although no placements changed, excitement was in the air when scores for Troopers and Colts were officially announced to qualify them for finals. Colts stayed steady in 11th with a 87.450 with Troopers only a quarter tenth behind in 12th. Troopers also opened up their spread against Crossmen to half a point who finished with a 86.925. Blue Knights rounded out the group in 14th with an 85.788. For Colts and Troopers, it was their first return to finals in 15 and 13 years respectively, while Crossmen and Blue Knights fell out of the top 12 for the first time in 9 and 19 years respectively.
For the remainder of semifinals on Friday, no other placement changes occurred with the exception of Bluecoats moving up to tie Boston Crusaders for second place. While many believed and hoped we could see a finals week surge from Boston to move up closer to Blue Devils, it was instead Bluecoats who seemingly came out of nowhere to put themselves in second place contention on Saturday night.
We now move to Saturday night. DCI World Championships Finals. The final performance for the 2022 season and the last time any drum corps will perform a full field show for more than 10 months. There were still many unknowns competitively going in, and so much to talk about when it was all said and done.
Troopers and Colts kicked things off with two incredible finals performances as the crowd welcomed them back to Saturday night with open arms. Despite the incredibly close spread in semifinals, it opened back up in finals, allowing for Colts to take 11th by more than seven tenths with an 87.2. For Troopers, although their finals night score fell by a point to a 86.425, it was still the final highest score in corps history since they finished ninth in 1985 with a 86.7.
Earlier in the season, Mandarins has consistently been scoring above Cavaliers and Phantom Regiment to make a strong case for their highest placement ever. Unfortunately, they slipped back a few spots in the finals week and settled for the second straight 10th place finish. However, the corps set a new record for a high score with a 90.013 and also became the first tenth place corps in DCI history to break 90.
One of the upsets of the evening came when Phantom Regiment passed Cavaliers for 8th place by 0.075. In doing so, Phantom beat Cavaliers for the first time since 2015 finals, and also secured their highest finish and score since 2016. Although Cavaliers were a respectable seventh place in percussion, it was ultimately a tenth place finish in the visual caption that hurt them most. WIth such a close finish, the focus will shift ahead to 2023 and a renewed rivalry between the Chicago-area neighbors.
Further ahead, Blue Stars finished in seventh with 92.775, setting a new corps record for highest score and their highest finish in over 40 years. They were propelled by a sixth place finish in visual proficiency, fifth place in color guard, and seventh place in general effect and music. At times, it looked as if Blue Stars could even pass The Cadets for sixth, however fell shy by less than two tenths. The Cadets had a respectable season however, finishing just shy of breaking 93 and in the top half of finals for the first time since 2016.
Santa Clara Vanguard sat by themselves in fifth place for most of the season and finished exactly there on finals night with a 95. Though they finished in their lowest spot since 2015, they broke 95 for a fifth consecutive season and also placed in the top 6 for the 10th consecutive season, an incredible streak surpassed currently by only Carolina Crown and Blue Devils. The percussion section also missed out on a fifth consecutive Fred Sanford Best Percussion Award, though placed second on finals night, half a tenth away from first.
Carolina Crown brought the audience to their feet with the fan-friendly hit “Right Here, Right Now” though they finished in fourth for the third consecutive season. In a similar situation as Vanguard, Crown won brass on finals night, but also fell short of winning their second consecutive Jim Ott Best Brass Award and eighth in 12 years. Crown has easily still maintained their status as a fan favorite with an elite hornline and will look ahead to moving back into medal contention next season.
Perhaps one of the biggest stories of finals night was the head to head competition between Bluecoats and Boston Crusaders after the two corps tied in semifinals. And in a complete surprise and perhaps incredibly rare occurrence, the corps tied again for the second night in a row. It was the first time since the 2002 season that two corps tied in two consecutive nights during World Championships week, and also the first time since the 2001 season that two corps tied for a spot in the top 3.
For Bluecoats, the season can be marked as an incredible success for moving into medal contention in the final week of the season and placing second for the second consecutive season. Likewise, high praise is due for winning their first ever Fred Sanford Best Percussion Award by a mere 0.01 in average score across the three nights; a shocking upset for the award that many hadn’t projected all season. With the Bluecoats now having received a medal seven times in corps history - more than Crown - it is time to consider the Canton corps as an all time elite and potential title contender for 2023.
The corps on the other side of the tie for a silver medal was none other than Boston Crusaders, a corps new to finishing in the top three. Although Crusaders didn’t take home the silver outright like many had projected going into finals week, they can still consider the 2022 season an incredible success in which they established themselves as a contender for a future championship. BAC also took home their third consecutive George Zingali Best Color Guard Award, as well as second place finishes on finals night in visual proficiency, brass, and music. Although Boston’s spread from first was never less than a point all weekend, they have certainly built a program that is title contending worthy next season.
And finally we arrive at Blue Devils, the newly crowned 2022 DCI World Champions. Blue Devils finished the year with yet another undefeated season, their first since 2017 and sixth since 2007. On finals night, Blue Devils had a nearly full sweep of captions, with the exception of brass and percussion, while winning with a final score of 98.75. Their winning spread of 1.425 was also the largest winning spread since their 2014 championship in which they won by 2.475 while setting the new record high score. Although placing second in brass on finals night, Blue Devils also took home the Jim Ott Best Brass Award for the first time since 2014, along with caption awards in General Effect and Visual. Even though the corps had not fielded in three years and was made up of almost entirely new members, Blue Devils once again showed their excellence throughout the summer and were well deserving of their 20th championship.
And so that does it! Our first competitive drum corps season in three years and DCI’s half century milestone year has come and gone in the blink of an eye. For many corps, it can be considered an incredibly successful season with plenty of new record scores, placements, and streaks maintained or broken. But for all, the real success was completing another season in the activity that we all love so dearly.
Thank you so much for reading Recap Rundown throughout the summer! I loved bringing the latest scores, trends, and competitive storylines to the forefront, and I hoped you enjoyed following along. Keep an eye on General Effect Media for our fall marching band season coverage to pick up soon, as well as our latest in offseason drum corps news. Until next time!
Marching Arts by the Numbers is a current staff writer and stats guru for General Effect Media. He has been involved in the marching arts activity for nearly two decades in a variety of roles. Marching Arts by the Numbers is his newest project with the vision of being the primary source of statistical information for the marching arts community. You can follow more of his work at @band_scores on Twitter.