(Wonkish.)

All modesty aside, my calls on the New Hampshire primaries last week were–what’s the technical term?–pretty dang good. I said it would be Trump, then Kasich with a close race for third. And I predicted a big win for Bernie Sanders. Granted, I did not expect it to be 22 points big, but it was clear to me from being there who had the boots on the ground and who didn’t. That made a difference.

So, what happens now? The Dems move to the Nevada caucuses, where a recent poll surely has sent shivers up the spine of the Clinton campaign. Target Point has the race at 45/45, but these figures should be viewed with a degree of suspicion since this firm polls primarily for Republicans. They are not even listed on the polling firm rankings at fivethirtyeight.

The Republicans vie for the winner-take-all South Carolina delegates, 50 in all. Recent, post-New Hampshire polls there have confirmed Trump’s lead remains unchanged or is improving. He’s polling at 35%-37%, pretty much where he was in the last January poll. Cruz follows at 20%, which also where he was. Rubio at 15, Bush and Kasich getting a NH bump to around 9.

In the midst of this pre-Super Tuesday scramble, it’s worth revisiting the rules of the game going forward. First, a couple of things seem clear at this point. (1) Donald Trump is apparently immune from a freefall, regardless of what he says or does. (2) The field is unlikely to narrow before March 15. I just don’t see Bush, Kasich, Rubio or Carson dropping out as a result of the micro momentum swings brought on by the coming primaries. And Trump and Cruz both have notched a W and will probably add a couple more in the next few weeks.

Ultimately it will be math and not money that drives candidates out of the game. So back to the rules. Trump is going win South Carolina. The rules state that it is winner take all both statewide and by congressional district: 29 for the states as a whole and 3 for each of the seven congressional districts. There is no data available on how congressional districts might vote, so let’s just assume that Trump will be able to win in at least 4 of them. Give two to Cruz (who is bringing his powerful grass roots machine to the state) and one to Rubio. So Trump will come out with at least 41 delegates, with 6 for Cruz and 3 for Rubio.

Let’s also just make it a three-way split for the 30 delegates at stake in the Nevada caucuses. Going into Super Tuesday, therefore, the best case scenario for Trump challengers looks something like this:

Trump: 68
Cruz: 27
Rubio: 23
Others: 12

But what happens Super Tuesday? 11 states awarding 565 delegates, distributed proportionally, but with thresholds required to receive any proportional slice of the delegate pie. That’s what. Here’s how it shakes out.

States with 20% thresholds: 343 delegates (AL, GA, TX, TN, VT). Right now, going by fivethirtyeight’s aggregate poll numbers, only Cruz and Trump beat the threshold in TX. Trump is the only candidate currently over the threshold in GA and if Alabama and TN shake out like South Carolina polls now, he’ll be the only one to get delegates there too.

But let’s weigh things in favor of the challengers. Say Georgia breaks 40-40-20 for Trump, Rubio and Cruz. And say Alabama and Tennessee break 60-40 Trump, Rubio (about where fivethirtyeight forecasts South Carolina will break). If we also assume Vermont breaks like New Hampshire did, the delegates awarded from these states would be:

Trump: 155
Cruz: 111
Rubio: 72
Kasich: 2
Bush: 2

Two 15% threshold states (AK, OK; 77 delegates). Let’s assume they break like Texas. In that case Cruz gets 48, Trump 29. Alaska is anyone’s guess, so let’s just give the backbenchers a break and divide up the 25 delegates evenly, 5 each. Minnesota (10% threshold; 39 delegates) is a caucus state, so let’s use Iowa as the template. This results in Trump getting 9, Cruz 11, Rubio 9, Kasich 1, Bush 1, Carson 4 (Assuming they all meet the threshold–hardly a given). If Massachusetts (with a 5% threshold and 39 delegates) goes the way of New Hampshire, Trump gets 17, Kasich 7, Cruz, Rubio and Bush 5 each. Finally, Virginia has no threshold and currently polling there would divide its 46 delegates as follows: Trump gets 15, Cruz 10, Rubio 11, Carson 4, Kasich 3 and Bush 3.

So based on current polling numbers and the above assumptions, the worst case scenario for Trump coming out of Super Tuesday could look something like this:

Trump: 298
Cruz: 218
Rubio: 125
Kasich: 24
Bush:19
Carson: 11

But there’s some chance Trump could shut out the rest of the field in Georgia, Tennessee and Alabama. If that should happen, the table would look more like this:

Trump: 385
Cruz: 202
Rubio: 54
Kasich: 24
Bush: 19
Carson: 11

But there’s another math problem that will begin to weigh on campaigns as they try to justify moving forward. That is who has won primaries, how many and who has not. It’s not at all inconceivable that after Super Tuesday, the only winners of primaries will be Trump and Cruz and the score there could be as lopsided as Trump: 10 to Cruz: 5–or worse. Through Super Tuesday, Rubio does not look to be in the running anywhere but, perhaps, Georgia in terms of scoring a W. He desperately wants to get to Florida on March 15, as Kasich does to Ohio on the same day. The question is whether they can spin the math to hang on.

But by then, the delegate math may have already swamped them. There are eight states with primaries between Super Tuesday and March 15, two with 20% thresholds, two with 15% thresholds, two with 10% thresholds.