2025 BOA Grand National Championships (Nov. 13-15)

[hsbandnerd212]

6 minutes ago, hsbandnerd212 said:

*Sigh*

For the record, I'm sighing at the amount of recent negativity in this thread, and nothing else.

[symphbee2]

Random thing that’s not infighting:

The last 3 times FloMo, TWHS, and Marcus all attended GN together they’ve all been the best TX band once:

2017: Marcus, FloMo, TW

2021: TW, FloMo, Marcus

2025:  FloMo, TW, Marcus

 

[MoBone]

3 minutes ago, cheeto2401 said:

flomo is not going back next year, lewisville schools rotate trips every 4 years (yes you're correct) because of the amount of funding that goes into it, especially with all those kids in both flomo and marcus, wouldve been more if hebron went as well

This is why, I guess I feel more for them. They were amazing! The band to beat! I’m not even on that side of Dfw , I’m over here with the Poteet’s, North and Horns lol but we know a good band when we see one. I was for sure they were going to win it all, but they (judges) really couldn’t let that happen and it really sucks. 

[clarinote]

2 minutes ago, hsbandnerd212 said:

For the record, I'm sighing at the amount of recent negativity in this thread, and nothing else.

"Recent negativity" and for the most part it's people saying they wish scoring was different. It is okay for people to have criticism of BOA and its scoring, and it's okay for people to feel upset about the results. 

[anotherbandmom]

Just wanted to acknowledge the admins for how well the forums have worked. Used to be it would just time out and I'd just give up and check in the morning. Tonight and last weekend I had zero issues even when traffic was high. Much better than the last couple of years, thanks txbands team. 🥳

[slowbrass]

21 minutes ago, natertater21000 said:

I’d really love to see BOA switch to a 30/30/40 split like DCI. I’ve always thought 20/20/60 is a bit too skewed. 

I agree, but this all still feels like sour grapes due to the timing. If you applied that split to the finals results at San Antonio last Saturday, Hebron gets an outright win. Flower Mound benefits from the current system just as much as Avon does. Just didn’t break their way tonight.

[MoBone]

9 minutes ago, Iplaydadrum said:

Unfortunate byproduct of the 20/20/60 distribution (imo they should just follow DCI and do 30/30/40). However, people should be celebrating the fact that this just confirms that Texas is producing some of the best trained marchers both visually and especially musically in the country by a large margin. It's even more crazy to think that even with FloMo winning music, they're still not number one musically in Texas (although I think you can argue that they had the best drumline in Texas this year and probably one of the best fronts).

What’s the split for UIL? I’m assuming it’s something in there that makes us the better marchers and musicians ? I assume uil doesn’t focus on the GE as much. 

[Vegas Band Fan]

I think that it’s important to give credit to Avon. They won tonight. Congratulations. Where I have an issue is not with the bands. They don’t make the decisions. It’s the judges and more importantly the way that the bands are judged. Something needs to change. Why is the GE score higher than music? Why are bands allowed to park and blow? If the music is so tough that you need to kneel and play then make changes to the music. BOA is known as the good ole boys network. Reminds me of something else.

[Iplaydadrum]

7 minutes ago, Vegas Band Fan said:

I remember something like this with Hebron taking 1st place in prelims at the 2023 GN.

No offense to Hebron 2023, but I had doubts they would win in 2023 because they're very far behind in visual GE, not really to my surprise. I easily saw them taking the music caption any day of the week and potentially visual given how much better they've gotten in visual since Covid . However, I don't think I've ever seen Hebron win visual GE or come top 2 for that matter in that subcaption and it's not like other bands are that far behind them in music GE. FloMo on the other hand did not having any weaknesses going into this competition which is why I and many others thought that they could win it. I want to add a disclaimer that I'm not discrediting any of these bands, at the end of the day they're all high schoolers and the level they perform at is ridiculous. I don't envy being a judge because I thought the top 5 shows this year were in a world of their own and I would have a hard time ranking them objectively without multiple rewatches. 

[Dallas Hobbs]

4 minutes ago, MoBone said:

What’s the split for UIL? I’m assuming it’s something in there that makes us the better marchers and musicians ? I assume uil doesn’t focus on the GE as much. 

4 music: ensemble, woodwinds, brass, percussion 

2 visual: ensemble, individual 

1 Content & Design Caption.

UIL Judges rank you in their respective caption then add their ranking ordinals together. Lowest total ordinal score wins

[natertater21000]

3 minutes ago, slowbrass said:

I agree, but this all still feels like sour grapes due to the timing. If you applied that split to the finals results at San Antonio last Saturday, Hebron gets an outright win. Flower Mound benefits from the current system just as much as Avon does. Just didn’t break their way tonight.

I would’ve been fine with that. It’s not so much sour grapes about team Texas/flomo, it’s more sour grapes at the band (any band) awarded for marching and playing the best not being given the win. Avon was on the other side of this exact scenario in 2016 and it left a bad taste in my mouth then too. That actually resulted in the rule change for ties. 

[MoBone]

What if we just have our own dang National championship , Dallas, Austin, San Antonio, take a pick. We’ll run 30/30/40. Tie breaker the bands have to sight read music and drill and have 15 mins to prep. We’ll run it on a 2 year rotation with Los Angeles and Tampa. I got $5 on it, who's with me?!?!  

[hsbandnerd212]

I'm going to sleep soon, and I hope y'all get some sleep too. 🙂

[MoBone]

4 minutes ago, Vegas Band Fan said:

I think that it’s important to give credit to Avon. They won tonight. Congratulations. Where I have an issue is not with the bands. They don’t make the decisions. It’s the judges and more importantly the way that the bands are judged. Something needs to change. Why is the GE score higher than music? Why are bands allowed to park and blow? If the music is so tough that you need to kneel and play then make changes to the music. BOA is known as the good ole boys network. Reminds me of something else.

Maybe we run US bands as protest (idk if usbands is any different but it’s the only thing I can think of lol) 

[MoBone]

6 minutes ago, Iplaydadrum said:

No offense to Hebron 2023, but I had doubts they would win in 2023 because they're very far behind in visual GE, not really to my surprise. I easily saw them taking the music caption any day of the week and potentially visual given how much better they've gotten in visual since Covid . However, I don't think I've ever seen Hebron win visual GE or come top 2 for that matter in that subcaption and it's not like other bands are that far behind them in music GE. FloMo on the other hand did not having any weaknesses going into this competition which is why I and many others thought that they could win it. I want to add a disclaimer that I'm not discrediting any of these bands, at the end of the day they're all high schoolers and the level they perform at is ridiculous. I don't envy being a judge because I thought the top 5 shows this year were in a world of their own and I would have a hard time ranking them objectively without multiple rewatches. 

There you go, no weaknesses and just flawless. I just knew we were gonna see our first Texas band win it all since Vandy. Alas 

[Dallas Hobbs]

11 minutes ago, Iplaydadrum said:

I don't think I've ever seen Hebron win visual GE or come top 2 for that matter in that subcaption

I think this year at BOA SA was the first I’ve ever seen them finish 2nd in visual GE. I think it’s also the highest visual GE score they’ve ever had in a BOA finals competition, explains why they tied Flo Mo for the trophy, imo 

[MoBone]

9 minutes ago, Dallas Hobbs said:

4 music: ensemble, woodwinds, brass, percussion 

2 visual: ensemble, individual 

1 Content & Design Caption.

UIL Judges rank you in their respective caption then add their ranking ordinals together. Lowest total ordinal score wins

Ok you know what I knew that from looking at area sheets. Lol which now that I think about it, it’s no wonder why musically and visually were the best of the best lol 

[JoeSchmoe]

28 minutes ago, MoBone said:

This is why, I guess I feel more for them. They were amazing! The band to beat! I’m not even on that side of Dfw , I’m over here with the Poteet’s, North and Horns lol but we know a good band when we see one. I was for sure they were going to win it all, but they (judges) really couldn’t let that happen and it really sucks. 

Exactly, and Avon goes every year…

[GeekBoy54]

The finals recap is up on music for all:

Music: Carmel and Flo Mo - 19.50, Avon - 19.40

Visual: Flo Mo - 19.725, Avon - 19.675

Music GE 1: Avon - 19.75, Flo Mo - 19.55

Music GE 2: Avon - 19.50, Flo Mo - 19.40

Visual GE: Avon - 19.50, Flo Mo - 19.45

It was incredibly close. BOA Grand Nats is competitive year after year, and this year was no different. 

You can feel sad for Flo Mo for not quite getting the win for Texas, but some of y'all need to take this negativity off this thread and go to sleep. There's no conspiracy, we don't need a major overhaul in the competition, and there's no need to bad mouth other programs. It's just how the margins fell. They had an incredible season and did Texas proud. 

[Iplaydadrum]

1 minute ago, Dallas Hobbs said:

I think this year at BOA SA was the first I’ve ever seen them finish 2nd in visual GE. I think it’s also the highest visual GE score they’ve ever had in a BOA finals competition, explains why they tied Flo Mo for the trophy, imo 

Oh yeah you're right, that's my bad. 

[asldx14]

1 minute ago, JoeSchmoe said:

We all knew it should’ve been a Flower Mound win, but we all said it was going to be Avon before the results were out, we knew this.

Well a lot of us realized that this was a tough competition and the medalists would all be neck and neck for the eagle.  There’s no need to throw a fit. The graceful way to deal with this is to congratulate the (talented and valid) winner. I would’ve loved to see a flomo win, but Avon was just as deserving. 

[JoeSchmoe]

Just now, asldx14 said:

Well a lot of us realized that this was a tough competition and the medalists would all be neck and neck for the eagle.  There’s no need to throw a fit. The graceful way to deal with this is to congratulate the (talented and valid) winner. I would’ve loved to see a flomo win, but Avon was just as deserving. 

I did say congrats! There’s just so much bias it’s crazy. 

[JoeSchmoe]

4 minutes ago, Justabandchild said:

Amidst all of this sour degeneracy, FUN FACT:

A Texas band has placed 7th in Grand National Finals in 2015, 2016, 2017, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, and 2025.

 

What they say in the judges room “oh which Texas band are we giving 7th place to this year” LOL

[crunchycookie3]

And so the trifecta (UIL State, BOASA, and Grand Nats) eludes capture yet again, and with none of the heavy hitters from TX set to go next year, doesn’t seem likely in the near future! There truly is something cursed about that 9th spot in finals LOL

[Iplaydadrum]

1 minute ago, asldx14 said:

Yeah tons of Texas bias in here!

I mean that's what you get when you introduce a metric to rank anything. Also I feel like it is somewhat justified to an extent, but not in a way that attacks the kids but more the designers. I think that the reason why a 30/30/40 split is more justifiable is because you want these competitions in which kids pour countless hours into to be about them and not about the designers. I don't think it's fair to reward designers over the kids when the designers aren't even the ones performing it. Also at the end of the day clean is clean and people are gonna take what was the cleanest and resonate the most with it (not that avon or any of the other bands weren't clean)