The showdown between the Blue Devils and the Bluecoats this weekend at Lucas Oil Stadium is set to be one of the most exciting races for gold we’ve seen in recent years at the DCI World Championships. 

The two corps have been in a back-and-forth tango of first-place finishes since their first head-to-head battle at DCI Broken Arrow on July 16th when Bloo first initiated the rivalry by topping the leaderboard at the end of the night. 

With four lead changes over the last month, a new Bluecoats show ending, and just a few days before DCI World Class prelims kicks off, let’s take a look at who may come out as the victor of the 2019 season.

Let’s Talk Scores

The levels of excellence these corps are exhibiting is perfectly wrapped up in this fact: the highest point margin between these two corps when head-to-head is 0.65 (it also happened to be the first time the two corps met on the road this season). 

In their next seven meetings, as little as 0.075 of a point separated the two proving that the details on the field really do matter if you want to come out on top. In their last three meetings, the Bluecoats have repeatedly won caption awards in General Effect and Music, while BD won Visual, and the Color Guard caption. With the scores being so close, how do the judges (and the fans) decide who deserves gold?

The X-Factors

Blue Devils: Fans should be prepared for the potential of a new closer from the Blue Devils on their Thursday Prelims performance. In the past, Lucas Oil is the spot to debut a new twist to shows with the goal of pushing their scores over the edge and beating out the surrounding competition. Many have predicted that the Devs are going to debut something big for their Finals push, and audiences should expect nothing less than something spectacular and theatrical from the Blue Devils.

Bluecoats: The Bluecoats really need to play up fan energy and on-field performance if they want to beat out BD. Think about the 2008 season of drum corps - in their Finals performance, Phantom Regiment comes out onto the field to perform their iconic ‘Spartacus’ show and against all odds, beats out the Blue Devils by 0.025 of a point. If you talk to any of the members or staff from Regiment that year, they’d say that the level to which they performed their show ended up winning them the championship title. Could history repeat itself and see the Blue Devils beaten out by the smallest of point differentials on the final day of competition?

Final Thoughts

No matter the outcome this Saturday, it should be said that this season of drum corps was one of the most entertaining and high-energy audiences have ever seen. 

The reason these two corps are so back and forth is because their levels of excellence and performance are in a whole new playing field when compared to the rest of the top 12 drum corps (as seen by the fact that the corps with the next closest score is over a full point behind the Blue Devils and the Bluecoats). Both of these shows are highly entertaining and feature unique elements that will make any audience fall in love with their performances. 

But ultimately, the winner will be decided by who leaves it all on the field in a little more spectacular manner than the other. So who do you think is going to pull off the "W" this Saturday night?