With three shows streamed by FloMarching yesterday, die hard drum corps fans had gone as far as to create spreadsheets combining the streaming schedules so they could figure out when to watch their favorite corps at each show. Mother Nature had other ideas, however, delaying the Memphis competition and turning Drums Along the Rockies into a standstill. Fortunately, the 2019 Tour of Champions - Northern Illinois event went off without a hitch. Let's review some of the takeaways from last night's show.

Focal Points:

• Will Colts maintain their lead over The Academy?
  
  The Colts indeed kept ahead of The Academy last night, increasing their point spread to nearly a full point. The Colts are doing this on the strength of their music program, as they finished ahead of Academy across the board. The Academy still has a significant deficit in percussion to make up, with more than half of their overall gap coming from that caption's scores.
  
  
• Mandarins and Phantom Regiment haven't been in the same place since the 2018 DCI World Championship Finals. Who will come on top in their first meeting in 2019?
  
  With a sixth tenth spread, the Mandarins remain ahead of Phantom after their first head-to-head meeting in 2019. The key to this result is visual, as the Mandarins have a half point advantage over Regiment in that overall caption. The Visual Proficiency subcaption is where the largest gap is, indicating that Phantom Regiment can make up ground by getting their feet cleaner then the corps from Sacramento.
  
  
• The Cavaliers get a chance to prove their changes and cleaning from the past week.
  
  The Wrong Side of the Tracks continues to develop. While the Green Machine lost a little ground on the Bluecoats on the sheets, the 2019 edition of the Cavaliers continues to excite and entertain the fans in the stands. The show is also coalescing form a design standpoint, as the influences from the movie Road to Perdition are becoming more apparent.
  
  
• How high can Bluecoats push their score without the pressure of SCV?
  
  While it is never a good idea to directly compare scores from different judging panels, Bluecoats and the Vanguard do remain close to one another in their competitive bracket, with Bloo scoring an 87.5 to Santa Clara's 87.2. These two corps will not see each other again until the DCI Broken Arrow show, on July 16th.