By Simon Zimmerman, Ohio contributor
Ohio and West Virginia’s opening weekend went off with a bang! Solon proved that their extraordinary 2024 season wasn’t a fluke by sweeping a loaded field at Beavercreek, while Hurricane showed once again that they are the class of West Virginia with their sweep at Nitro.
This weekend, many of the region’s most prominent groups will converge in Winfield, West Virginia, for the annual Emerald Classic competition, which will feature competitive matchups across all divisions.
The field (as it currently stands) is:
Large Mixed - Huntington "Illusions", Olentangy "Keynotes", Loveland "By Request", Marysville "Swingers Unlimited"
Small Mixed - Doddridge County "Bel Canto Bulldogs", Riverside "Melodic Fusion", Portsmouth "Expressions", Poca "Visual Volume", Nitro "Showcats", St. Clairsville "St. C Singers"
Womens - Cabell Midland "Rhythm in Red", Olentangy "She-Notes", Loveland "Allure"
All three of the groups in the womens division started their season last weekend. At Nitro, Cabell Midland kicked off their fourth season as a women’s group with a solid third-place finish in the Single-Gender division, behind womens groups from Hurricane and Winfield. Their Las Vegas-themed show took home an award for Best Costumes, and though they failed to beat the other women’s groups, they did beat the only bass group at the competition, Marion Harding Singers Xtreme, who have a head-to-head win over Olentangy She-Notes in 2024. The She-Notes, for their part, will come into Winfield looking to improve upon their finish at the bottom of Beavercreek’s competitive womens division. This won’t be easy, as they will face a rematch against one of the groups that beat them at Beavercreek, Loveland Allure. Allure, for their part, finished third in the womens division at Beavercreek, not making finals for the first time since 2022. They’ll be looking to get back on their usual track for the rest of the season, which would start with a win at Winfield.
The Small Mixed division will be incredibly competitive, with the highlight being a matchup of two rival West Virginia small mixed groups. Those groups are Poca Visual Volume and the Nitro Showcats. Neither group has formally started their competitive season yet, though Nitro did host their annual Showcats classic last weekend. Both groups will be looking to get their season started on the right foot here at Winfield after having fairly different 2024 seasons. Nitro suffered from a bit of a slump after seeing great success in 2022 and 2023 (though a slump for Nitro would be a great season for any number of groups); they made finals at every competition besides a very competitive Cosby (which featured John Burroughs, Chesterton, and Troy Buchanan), and they placed on the overall podium twice, including a second place finish at Robert C. Byrd. Still, they fell behind some of their rivals, including Poca, who started their 2024 season by winning Small Mixed at Winfield, though they later fell behind groups like Winfield and Herbert Hoover. However, they did beat Nitro both times they competed against each other last season, and its safe to say that this year’s matchup will be competitive.
Still, there is the potential for some of the other small mixed groups to play spoiler at this competition. The St. Clairsville St. C Singers, in particular, will be a group to watch here; last weekend, in their first competition under new direction, they managed to break a streak of not placing with a second place finish in a difficult Small Mixed field at Nitro, where they beat perennial contenders Sissonville and Herbert Hoover. They’ll be looking to show that that placement wasn’t a fluke, which they could do definitively with a strong placement at Winfield. Another group to watch are the Doddridge County Bel Canto Bulldogs, who started their first season under the direction of Tracy Alfred with a second place finish in their division to a resurgent Ripley group. They will come into this competition looking to show that they remain a contender, despite the change in direction. Finally, Portsmouth Expressions and Riverside Melodic Fusion are both coming into this competition with some results to their name; Portsmouth won the Small Mixed division at Marysville last year, while Riverside placed second in Small Mixed at Capital’s competition before not placing at Sissonville and Herbert Hoover. Both groups are starting their season at Winfield, and both will look to make waves here to start their season.
Finally, there’s Large Mixed. Two groups in this division started their season last weekend at Beavercreek. Loveland By Request, which has not placed outside the podium since 2019, had an uncharacteristically low fif-place finish at Beavercreek, though they took home an award for Best Set (their lighthouse set is admittedly very cool) and one of their members won Best Male Soloist. Loveland hasn’t quite been the powerful group they once were since 2023, and they were likely disappointed with their placement at Beavercreek, so they will be looking for a comeback at Winfield to prove that last weekend was a fluke. The Olentangy Keynotes, meanwhile, finished in sixth place at Beavercreek, though they did win an award for Best Costumes and their opening bagpipe player won Best Instrumentalist. Olentangy has experienced their ups and downs since the pandemic, and last week was likely a low; however, they will be returning to Winfield, where they split captions with Marysville in 2024, one of their highest highs. All this is to say, watch out for the Keynotes - they’ll be hungry to replicate their past success and show that their low placement at Beavercreek was a fluke.
The final Ohio group coming to Winfield is Marysville Swingers Unlimited, for whom this is their first competition of 2025. Marysville was Ohio’s consensus top group in 2024, and they’re likely to be up there again in 2025. Still, they do have something to prove this season - three of their five wins in 2024 were caption splits (including their season opening win at Winfield), and their finish behind Carmel and Brandon at Chesterton left many questions about their national standing. They’ll be looking for a strong start to a competition season that will see them face top groups from Ohio, Indiana, and California with a win at Winfield.
Winfield will take two womens finalists, three small mixed finalists, and three large mixed finalists, which means one womens group, three small mixed groups, and a large mixed groups will not make finals. With how competitive some of these groups are, the battle to make finals should be pretty competitive, and it will be very interesting to see how it all plays out.
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