“Five, six, seven, eight” rings through the cafeteria as new head coach Kathrine D’ercole prepares the dance team during an after school practice. The fall dance team entertains the student section at football games during the season; now that it has ended, the winter dancers leap in to start their performances.
“The biggest difference is that the girls shift their focus from football performances to competition performances,” D’ercole said. “They have two routines that they will compete in. Smaller competitions, starting in December, will gear them up to their national competition in Orlando, Florida.”
The winter team also dances at varsity basketball games, but competition conflicts can prevent them from performing at every home game. Their competitions take priority over games but they like to perform at the games when they can.
“We use the basketball games as dress rehearsals for our competition routines and since we don’t have as many that work with our schedule, it’s gonna be our biggest challenge,” D’ercole said. “We won’t be able to be in front of the crowd and practice.”
Dancers have different favorite parts of the team. Some enjoy football season because of the games while others like traveling and competing more.
“My favorite part of football season is game day,” senior captain Madeline Fender said, “I love football games and the energy of them. My favorite part about competition season is the team bonding and nationals.”
Though many of the same dancers participate both in the winter and fall season, some choose to take a break in the winter. Tryouts for both the winter and fall teams took place on Jun. 14. at Chantilly. Even though they are at the same time it is not required for the dancers to do both and if they are on the fall team it is not guaranteed that they will make the winter team.
“During tryouts, the dancers can put on their tryout form if they’re interested in being part of the competition team and the judges and coaches take that into account,” D’ercole said. “Then we will let them know at tryouts if they’ve made either our performance team, which does those Friday night football games, or if they’re also invited to be in the competition team.”
Last year, the competitive team placed first in the pom category and second in jazz category
(Saaya Patel)
on Dec. 10 at St. Paul VI Catholic High School. Another senior captain, Rebecca Glasier, was on the team last year and she noticed improvement in dance technique from years past that can help them this year.
Fender thinks that their biggest challenge is the ability to stay focused. The girls friendship can be an advantage and distraction.
“We’re all really good friends,” Fender said. “We like to joke around and like to have fun with each other, but as we’re moving into competition season, we have to stay focused and remain on track during our practices or we’re never going to achieve the things that we’re looking for.”
D’ercole has big expectations for the team and hopes that they will continue to improve from the first competition at Oakton High School on Dec. 15 all the way to nationals in Orlando, Florida.
“Honestly, I don’t have any expectations of how they’ll be placed, I just want them to put their best foot forward each time we perform,” D’ercole said, “ I expect the team to keep growing.”
