The Big Ten gymnastics season opener on January 17 between Ohio State and Rutgers ended with the Buckeyes securing the win, 195.750 to Rutgers’ 194.100. But the scoreboard wasn’t what kept people talking afterward. Instead, the spotlight shifted as Ohio State head coach made it clear she was not satisfied with how the meet was judged.

Just after the meet, head coach Meredith Paulicivic questioned several deductions she felt were unclear or unfair. “My group looks OK. I’m a little bit severely disappointed in the judging today. I think this is a real problem with what’s going on in the country,” she said.

She added that the inconsistencies made it difficult to explain scores to her athletes. From start to finish, Ohio State was solid in all four events: vault (48.975), uneven bars (48.700), balance beam (48.900) and floor (49.175).

That consistency made for a very comfortable lead, just ahead of a tough Rutgers, who went clean with tight routines throughout that kept the meet close right until the last rotation. It appeared to be a hard-fought, closely contested game from the stands, but from the Ohio State bench however, concern was growing.

“There’s been several meets, and the deductions today are just… I can’t even explain them to my athletes. So I’m a little frustrated with the judging. I think my team’s doing well. We had last-minute changes to lineouts, and I think they’re handling that stuff well.”

A focal point of discussion was Tory Vetter, Ohio State’s top scorer. With a total all-around score of 39.175, she had solid performances on all four apparatus: vault (9.850), bars (9.825), beam (9.725) and floor (9.775).

Vetter’s consistency was key to keeping Ohio State in front in such a tight meeting, even as her deductions became a point of contention, despite winning the vault and all-around titles. When asked about it, Paulicivic said it was about the bigger picture.

“No, it’s bad when I can’t even explain it to the athlete, and they look at me and I say, ‘I don’t know what to tell you.’ And this is a big problem in the Big Ten. When you look at the rest of the country and the way things are being scored, it affects our rankings. Even if we have a good meet, we could drop this week. And that’s a problem. So I’m not very happy. I’m not going to lie.”

Despite the judging controversy, Ohio State walked away with the team win. But the debate about scoring has always been an issue.

Scoring inconsistencies shook NCAA gymnastics

Scoring has long been a contentious issue in NCAA gymnastics. Before 2025, there were clear signs of score inflation. In 2022, 71 perfect 10s were awarded across NCAA women’s gymnastics, a significant jump from earlier years. That number rose to 84 in 2023 and 87 in 2024, leading many to believe that routines were being overscored.

But everything changed in 2025. The first weekend of NCAA women’s gymnastics ended with no perfect 10 scores at all across all competitions. That was the first time this had happened in almost four years and surprised many fans and analysts, as perfect tens had become very common from 2022-2024. This absence signaled that judges were taking fewer high marks and applying more deductions than in previous seasons.

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The shift was largely due to the NCAA introducing a new judging evaluation system called the SCORE Board (Standardize Consistency in Officiating of Routine Evaluation) in 2025. Under this system, judges were tracked and rated on the accuracy of their calls, and these ratings could affect future assignments. The goal was to reduce arbitrary or inconsistent deductions and make scoring more uniform across all meets.

Nevertheless, questions about the scoring remained. Utah head coach Carly Dockendorf was openly critical of the judging following her team’s showing at a big early-season meet, saying she and her staff “had no idea how we got those scores.”

She said, “The scoring was interesting today… it’s really hard to put together a beautiful routine, and not feel like you’re being rewarded.”

At the same time, high-profile gymnastics athletes like Olivia Dunne voiced concerns on social media. Dunne said she “want[s] people who do things that look great to be rewarded,” and argued that “too many deductions taken at a judge’s discretion… at some point it feels negative and loses the entertainment factor that draws the crowd in.”

Some of the season’s most debated scores were handed out at the 2025 Florida-Auburn meet. Leanne Wong, a U.S. Olympic alternate, scored a 10 on balance beam despite making an apparent stop on her dismount. Many people who watched the sport thought that she should have been deducted for the landing, but both judges gave her a 10.0.

Minutes later, another top gymnast, Faith Torrez, earned a perfect 10 on vault, despite clearly hopping forward on her landing , a mistake that usually garners a 0.05 or 0.10 penalty.

This only fueled the feeling that judges were occasionally too kind when coming up with perfect scores, even with the new SCORE Board system.