International Swimming League Standings Update after 3 Weeks

HOW STANDINGS WORK

At each of the 6 regular season meets, teams will score points based on their relative finish order, as follows:

• 1st place – 4 points
• 2nd place – 3 points
• 3rd place – 2 points
• 4th place – 1 point

There are no ‘style’ points – whether the margins of each meet are 1 point or 100 points, the table above is how much is earned.

At the end of the 6 regular seasons meets (2 Group A, 2 Group B, 1 ‘derby’ meet with all US teams, and 1 ‘derby’ meet with all European teams), the teams will be ranked by continent (not “Group”). All 4 American teams will be ranked, and all 4 European teams will be ranked, and the top 2 American teams will go to the final, as will the top 2 European teams.

In theory, a team could win its ‘continent’ table without winning a single meet, because most of the meets are not grouped by ‘continent’ (see last weekend in Indy, which had 2 European and 2 American teams).

Note: ISL uses ‘points’ to describe many different scoring systems: meet points, MVP points, standings points, and prize money points. We’ll try to differentiate between those points as best we can in our coverage.

Current Standings After Meet 1

Europe:

The classes of Europe are clearly Energy Standard and the London Roar. Those two teams have combined to win all 3 ISL meets so far this season. The odd-team out on the continent right now appears to be Iron Swim, which, at full strength, could make a claim at being one of the top 4 teams in the league.

Aqua Centurions are all-but-eliminated from contention from the final at this point. Mathematically they could tie for the 2nd-place spot, but that would require a series of events that won’t happen. Energy Standard, likewise, is not yet locked in to the final, but another 3rd-place finish from Iron in Budapest this week would mean that the worst Energy Standard could do in the group would be tie for 2nd. We don’t know what the tie-breakers are in the team table yet, but we assume that it’s points scored at meets.

America:

While the American table looks a little murkier on paper, the Cali Condors and LA Current have emerged as the two leaders in the group. While the DC Trident will be within striking distances for their hosted derby, they’d probably need an unlikely win there to sneak into the American top 2.

While the Breakers are not mathematically eliminated after 1 meet, theyw ould need a far-better performance in Budapest than they had in Lewisville to make the top 2. They were 123.5 points short of 3rd place, so that’s a really tall mountain to climb, but there are opportunities for the Breakers to at least close that gap.

2019 ISL Season Schedule: