Dan Balash

This is how Texas does their state series of competitions. Always wild to see a band score in the top 10 in multiple captions, have an outlier number and get knocked out. https://smbc.uiltexas.org/

That is the Pontiac Indian showdown recap. 🙂

Honestly...hire outside judges, if it can be worked into the budget. It's nice to get other people's perspectives on shows. This is D.D. Eisenhower's 4th competition of the season, and the third time they've been judged by Mike Madonia and Justin Clintsman, Clintsman every time on Visual Individual, and Madonia twice on Music GE and once on Visual Ensemble. Sidenote: Madonia and Jeff Fiedler will be judging this weekend at EIU.

Has anyone seen a scoring recap from NIU or 3A-4A Edwardsville?

Geneseo Maple Leaf Classic: Geneseo, IL A: 368.700 Galva (GE, Percussion) 363.900 Rockridge (Music, Color Guard, DM) 360.900 Sherrard (Visual) 346.900 Orion AA: 461.500 Western Dubuque, IA (Visual, DM) 460.100 Macomb (GE, Color Guard) 440.600 Rochelle Township (Music) 409.800 Rock Falls 386.600 Streator Township (Percussion ) AAA: 496.600 Minooka Community (Music, Visual, GE, Percussion, Color Guard) 431.600 United Township (DM) 423.800 Bettendorf, IA

IVC Grey Ghost Classic: A: 68.900 Dwight D. Eisenhower (Music, Visual, GE, Percussion, Color Guard) 55.800 Farmington 53.950 St. Joseph-Ogden AA: 64.650 Kewanee (Visual, GE) 62.950 Danville (Color Guard) 62.400 Richwoods (Music, Percussion) AAAA: 74.650 Normal (Music, Visual, GE, Percussion, Color Guard) 69.550 Galesburg 66.200 Pekin Community AAAAA: 77.000 Morton (Music, Visual, GE, Percussion, Color Guard) 67.450 Champaign Central

Yeah, and Grand Champion later on was named based on an asinine prelims/finals combo score, so when Greendale, WI won prelims in 2016 by 3 points, and then Lake Park won finals by 1.1 over Greendale, Greendale was named as Grand Champions.

Also, I know it's SUPER early, but open dates for ISU next year are currently September 26th, October 3rd and October 17th.

Forgot to add this show: Rich Township Raptor Rumble is October 18.

I would MAYBE be down for a 4-4-7 split, but a 5-3-7 split when 9 out of the 12 bands in 3A-4A last year would have outscored a potential 5th finalist from 1A-2A (IVC)?

Wild when you see what used to be on the schedule. Lake Park as a prelims/finals show Stagg as a midseason, Sunday show St. Rita with a Sunday show Atwood-Hammond, Olympia, Sparta, Wheaton North, Metropolis all had shows. Alton had a long running show. Greater St. Louis used to be at the Dome at America's Center, with 40+ bands. Everyone and their mother had a parade.

7:00, 7:15, 7:30,. 7:45, 8:00, 8:15, 8:30, 8:45, 9:00, 9:15 - Bands 1-10 9:30 Break, judges switch out 9:45, 10:00, 10:15, 10:30, 10:45, 11:00, 11:15, 11:30, 11:45, 12:00 - Bands 11-20 12:15 Break, Panel 1 back in 12:30, 12:45, 1:00, 1:15, 1:30, 1:45, 2:00, 2:15, 2:30, 2:45 - Bands 21-30 3:00 Break, Panel 2 back in 3:15, 3:30, 3:45, 4:00, 4:15, 4:30, 4:45, 5:00, 5:15, 5:30 - Bands 31-40 5:45 Big Red Marching Machine 6:00-6:30ish Awards, Class Champions named, announce finalists 7:30, 7:45, 8:00, 8:15, 8:30, 8:45, 9:00, 9:15, 9:30, 9:45, 10:00, 10:15, 10:30, 10:45 - Finals (bottom 7/top 7, with judges from Panel 1 and Panel 2 in different captions) 11:00 Awards Drawbacks: Long day, 1A champion possibly doesn't make finals under this format, Chicago area/south bands would push back with early start time.

Not possible though as the judges shift between classes. Unless they do ISU like they do BOA Super Regionals and Nationals, where they rotate out the judges on each break? Have 5 bands from each panel make finals, with the next 5 highest scoring bands regardless of panel in finals? Example: 40 band prelims, judging panel 1 judges bands 1-10, break, judging panel 2 judges 11-20, break, back to panel 1, break, panel 2, done with prelims.

That's what I get for going side by side on my laptop screen.

Predictions: IVC: A: 1) D.D. Eisenhower 2) Farmington 3) St. Joseph-Ogden 2A: 1) Richwoods 2) Danville 3) Kewanee 4A: 1) Normal 2) Galesburg 3) Pekin Community 5A: 1) Morton 2) Champaign Central GC: Morton Plainfield South: 2A: 1) Lemont 2) Wheaton Warrenville South 3) Kaneland 3A: 1) Lincoln-Way 2) Waubonsie Valley 3) Plainfield East GC: Lincoln-Way NIU: I hope that I don't get annoyed as can be at the scores again this year. Here's hoping that fiasco from last year is rectified. This is a very good show this year with some high quality out of stand bands. 1A: 1) H.D. Jacobs 2) Richards 3) Lakes Community 2A: 1) Batavia 2) Eureka 3) Carl Sandburg 3A: Will be close, I think. 1) Romeoville 2)Oswego 3) Split between Waukee Northwest and Naperville Central, with a point separating Waukee Northwest and Naperville Central at BOA Iowa last year, with Northwest coming out on top. I'll go with my Illinois homerism and pick Naperville Central. 4A: 1) John Hersey 2) Davenport Central 3) Yorkville GC: Going to be close. I'll go with John Hersey. Still feels odd that they're ending their season here. Geneseo: 1A: 1) Sherrard 2) Galva 3) Rockridge. One of the most unpredictable classes of the weekend. 2A: 1) Macomb 2) Rock Falls 3) Streator Township 3A: 1) Minooka Community 2) United Township 3) Bettendorf, IA GC: Minooka Edwardsville: 1A: 1) Mt. Carmel 2) Wesclin 3) Carlyle 2A: 1) Effingham 2) Waterloo 3) Civic Memorial 3A: 1) Parkway West 2) Triad 3) Highland 4A: 1) O'Fallon Township 2) Belleville West 3) Marquette GC: O'Fallon Township

The ILMarching forums were hit by a spam attack last night and this morning. We apologize for any inconvenience/annoyance this may have caused. We are looking into how to fix this. If you remember back in the old days, new posters were not allowed to create topics until they reached a certain amount of posts. We are looking into the forums system and seeing if we can set that up again. For the time being, we have done the following All new accounts must respond to the registration email (which was already in effect) and must be approved by an administrator. If you have a weird email address/username, or if your IP address tracks to a VPN or overseas, you're not getting approved. We have set up the question "what is this website about?" Pretty self explanatory. If you have any thoughts or ideas, shoot me an email at balash@ilmarching.com. Thanks.

Washington: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KDPDHET1Tw&t=16s Prospect: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbDyVFEkY0M&t=10867s IVC: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2Qh5PBuuiE Limestone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKNd3vYgNt0 VJA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SAW_cqX--sg Lemont, Huntley, Warren, DGS, Marian, Plainfield North, Romeoville, Oswego East (the stream is split into several videos): https://fan.hudl.com/usa/il/tinley-park/organization/5333/andrew-high-school/watch?b=QnJvYWRjYXN0MjY5OTE5OQ%3D%3D

For those of you looking for videos of ISU bands, here's some that I found that are recent: Herscher at about 31:50, El Paso-Gridley at about 1:47:45, Praire Central at 2:23:30, UHigh at 3:22:00, Bloomington at 4:11:00, Joliet West at 4:27:45, Pontiac at 4:39:00.

1A: 53.600 Dwight D. Eisenhower (Music, Visual, GE, Percussion, Auxiliary) 42.350 Grant Community 37.900 Johnsburg 35.950 Marengo 2A: 53.450 Elk Grove (Music, Visual, GE, Percussion) 47.650 Lakes Community (Auxiliary) 43.100 Antioch 3A: 50.050 Grayslake Central 46.650 McHenry (Music, Visual, GE, Percussion) 43.700 Round Lake (Auxiliary) KMT 2025 Recap.xlsx

Bah. At least we don't live in Texas where 3-4 schools have the same name!

The battle for 3A and 4A finalists is going to be an interesting one to watch. Marian as 3A champion, then (probably) Batavia/Romeoville for the 4A title, and then add in Collinsville, Lemont, Bloomington and Washington for spots 3-5. There'll be 5 bands basically going after 3 finals berths.

it's Hillsboro, IL, making their competitive debut.

My occasional dyslexia strikes again. Edwardsville is actually at 2360, which SHOULD move them into 5A and O'Fallon Township into 6A.

ISU Schedule: 7:06 AM: Eureka 7:20 AM: Pontiac Township 7:34 AM: East Peoria 7:48 AM: Illinois Valley Central 8:02 AM: Morton 8:16 AM: El Paso-Gridley 8:30 AM: Macomb 8:44 AM: Galesburg 8:58 AM: Break 9:12 AM: Prairie Central 9:26 AM: Limestone Community 9:40 AM: University 9:54 AM: Herscher 10:08 AM: LaSalle-Peru 10:22 AM: Paris Cooperative 10:36 AM: Effingham 10:50 AM: Streator Township 11:04 AM: Awards 11:24 AM: Romeoville 11:38 AM: Batavia 11:52 AM: Washington Community 12:06 PM: Lemont 12:20 PM: Collinsville 12:34 PM: Break 12:48 PM: Mascoutah 1:02 PM: Marian Catholic 1:16 PM: Maine West 1:30 PM: Bloomington 1:44 PM: Awards 2:04 PM: Joliet West 2:18 PM: Oswego East 2:32 PM: Victor J. Andrew 2:46 PM: Prospect 3:00 PM: Normal 3:14 PM: Plainfield Central 3:28 PM: Carl Sandburg 3:42 PM: Mundelein 3:56 PM: DeKalb 4:10 PM: Break 4:24 PM: Oswego 4:38 PM: Warren Township 4:52 PM: Edwardsville 5:06 PM: McHenry 5:20 PM: Huntley 5:34 PM: Downers Grove South 5:48 PM: O'Fallon Township 6:02 PM: Plainfield North Exb 6:16 PM: ISU Big Red Marching Machine 6:30 PM: Awards

Has anyone seen a recap for this one yet?