Women's Team Final Preview

Qualification Scores:

1. USA - 181.863
2. RUS - 180.429
3. CHN - 176.637
4. ROU - 176.264
5. GBR - 170.656
6. JPN - 170.196
7. ITA - 168.397
8. CAN - 167.696

What to watch for:

The United States qualified with the top score and looked dominating on Vault especially. What they will want to do tomorrow is definitely perform better on Floor Exercise. With the 3 up, 3 count the US can't afford the out of bounds deductions that they incurred night one if they want to stay a safe distance ahead of the Russians. I am thrilled that the US will go up last in the last rotation.

Russia looked strong. It remains to see if they will throw more Amanars in the Team Final than they did night one to keep up with the excellent vaulting of the Americans. Their lowest scoring event night one was also Floor, they will be looking to raise that tomorrow night. They will need hit routines from their stars Mustafina and Komova.

China will be looking to improve on Floor also, as they finished 8th overall night one, as well as a bit on Vault. They will definitely need big routines on their best event, the Uneven Bars, to be in contention for a medal.

Romania will simply need to be better on everything than they were night one, with the exception of Floor Exercise, where they were the top scorers. The Uneven Bars, as we all know, are a weakness for them, but they need to hit routine after routine, focusing on execution.

** Sidenote - I just realized that I said 3/4 of these teams needed to improve on floor, however, 2 of the 3 were ranked 2nd and 3rd overall on FX night one. I really think that there was something going on with the judging/scoring .. it just didn't seem right to me.

My medal podium:

Gold - United States
Silver - Russia
Bronze - Romania