Dancing with the Stars Super Bowl night: Guillermo and Witney Carson eliminated

Dancing with the Stars played its Super Bowl Night on Tuesday, October 13, with every routine set to songs by past halftime performers and Joe Buck joining Carrie Ann Inaba, Derek Hough, and Bruno Tonioli as guest judge. At the end of it, Jimmy Kimmel's sidekick Guillermo Rodriguez and pro Witney Carson went home, after a salsa to Bad Bunny's "Tití Me Preguntó" — a song by the man headlining the actual next halftime show.

Guillermo's goodbye was pure Guillermo. The cast and pros hoisted him into the air, and he turned to his partner first:

"Witney, I love you for teaching me how to dance, thank you so much."

— Guillermo Rodriguez, in the elimination segment

Carson — who has been competing while pregnant — answered in kind, thanking him "for making the season just so fun, so enjoyable." The last two couples standing on stage were Guillermo/Witney and Tyler Cameron/Sharna Burgess, though the show no longer confirms an official bottom two.

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The voting war that ended Tuesday

Guillermo's five-week run was the season's loudest argument. He and Carson repeatedly posted the lowest judges' scores of the night and kept surviving on viewer votes, which had fans of stronger couples crying rigged — and comparing him to Andy Richter's long run last season. Kimmel, who had been campaigning for his sidekick on air, answered the accusations directly:

"People don't understand the competition isn't rigged. Life is rigged in Guillermo's favor."

— Jimmy Kimmel, on Jimmy Kimmel Live!

He added that Guillermo was winning even though "probably half the people voting cannot spell the word Guillermo." The campaign worked for four eliminations; Super Bowl Night was the fifth.

Four weeks of bottom-of-the-board scores couldn't send Guillermo home. The fifth did — to a song by the man headlining the real halftime show in February.

The actual leaderboard

The night's top mark was a season-high tie at 36 out of 40 — straight 9s for Paralympian Ezra Frech with Daniella Karagach (salsa, Nelly's "Hot in Herre") and Jenna Dewan with Val Chmerkovskiy (paso doble, Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance"). Tyler Cameron delivered what judges called his best dance of the season, and still ended the night standing next to the eliminated couple.

Ten couples remain: Julia Stiles, Maura Higgins, Jackson Olson, Harry Shum Jr., Amber Glenn, Ezra Frech, Jenna Dewan, Tatyana Ali, Connor Wood, and Tyler Cameron, with their pros. On the season's current form, the Frech–Dewan scoring duel is the one to watch — and with Guillermo gone, the votes-versus-scores discourse needs a new main character.

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