On Wednesday, February 8, the Chesterton High School cheerleading team flew down to Orlando, Florida to compete in the National High School Cheerleading Championship. The competition is put on by UCA or the Universal Cheerleaders Association and takes place at the ESPN Wide World Of Sports Complex. This year, there were nearly 1,200 teams that competed. All teams were required to earn a bid at their UCA regional competition in 2023.
The CHS team brought down 20 cheerleaders and nine lifters and competed in the game-day division. For the game-day division, the routine is split up into four parts: band dance, sideline, crowd cheer, and fight song. There are many different factors that go into scoring and judging. However, it is mostly all about crowd involvement while using stunting, signs, and flags to get the crowd involved effectively.
Chesterton proudly has the largest coed program in Indiana which places them into the large coed division. To qualify for large coed, teams must have at least eight guys. This year, there were only eight other schools across the country that qualified for large coed game day at UCA nationals. Every school in the division except for Chesterton comes from southern states like Alabama, Mississippi, and Texas.
At the competition, Chesterton unfortunately did not make it into the finals, taking seventh in the semi-finals. However, the routine that was put out on the mat was still one to be very proud of. Chesterton improved their score from last year by five points! The team especially excelled in the band dance and fight song portion of the routine. They scored higher than five of the competing scores for those areas of the routine. While the team may not have gotten the results they’d hoped for, the performance is nothing short of amazing.
It is a shared feeling by many of the cheerleaders that their hard work has paid off and is shown by their performance. Since the cheerleader’s season lasts 11 months out of the year, there is much time to hone in on their skills. In addition to football season, the cheerleaders also cheer at many boys and girls basketball games which gave them a lot of time to practice performing for crowds.
“I think that performing the fight song multiple times each game really helped us in that area. It clearly showed that that repetition and hard work paid off!” said Junior Nicole Marciniak.
Aside from the performance aspect of the national experience, the team was able to enjoy a long weekend of memories at the five Disney parks. Being able to have that bonding time at the happiest place on earth was a great experience for the team. While the national placements did not go ideally, a lifetime of memories was definitely made.
“My favorite memory from nationals was going on the Tron ride for the first time,” beamed Senior Kya Trafny.
Aside from the fun at the parks, the team also enjoyed bonding time at the Disney Coronado Springs resort. Whether it was hanging out at the pools, or talking in the hotel rooms, the national trip was one for the books.
It was quite an emotional nationals for the seniors as it is their last year competing at the high school level. The work has been hard but very rewarding. Bella Walsh is a four-year senior which has made it extra emotional for her, seeing that it is the end of a long era.
“It was a lot of excitement and sadness because my comp season is now over,” said Walsh.
Senior Tate Wilcox has also been cheering for most of her life. She’s been on all star teams and has been on Chesterton’s Varsity for two years. However, this isn’t the end of her cheer career as she will continue onto Moorehead State’s cheer team.
“It was a lot of emotions because I didn’t anticipate that’s how I’d end high school. It was disappointing but bittersweet to take in the moment,” said Wilcox.
Along with the ending of high school, it was also the beginning for many. This year the CHS cheer team has decided to put the junior varsity team onto the mat. It was an ambitious feat but they took the challenge and ran with it. It is safe to say that it was a very good decision. However, it took a lot of work.
“We worked very hard in Saturday morning practices! We started our competition season in May which was very early,” said Junior Ava Casselman.
It can be quite nerve racking going onto the varsity mat and competing alongside experienced cheerleaders. However, the jv squad took the task at hand and performed phenomenally.
“It was a little bit scary performing for the first time, but I had a lot of fun and am excited for next year!” said Freshman Cole Gilbert.
