“When they came off the floor at the very end, they were screaming,” said Cordova High School cheerleading coach Arissa Pearson. “They were so excited. It was just amazing.”
The Cordova High School (CHS) cheer squad placed seventh against 11 other Division II schools at the state competition in Anchorage. But as Pearson noted in an interview, they did the best they could.
“By the time it was our turn they went out and they shined,” she said.
One cheerleader, Morgan Saiget, was again named to the all-tournament team.
“She has been on the squad since she was a freshman,” Pearson said. “She does ballet. She is a fantastic dancer and the one on top of all the pyramids. She has fantastic balance.”
While all the girls put in many hours of practice, they are also academically strong, she said. Every trip the squad goes on includes time for homework, as they are considered students before they are athletes, said Pearson, who is also a teacher at CHS.
Competitors in the cheerleading event are given a set of guidelines in advance of each tournament, telling them specifically what they will be judged on.
For the sideline competition, judging was based in part on crowd effectiveness, including visual appeal and motion technique. The volume of cheers from the crowd plays into this, and motion technique is the most difficult when with new girls on the team, according to Pearson.
“You have to be moving with purpose, not just moving your arms,” she said.
The cheer season began in December. During the winter break from school, the squad spends the majority of time in the gym, similar to what they do over spring break.
“No matter how perfect their routine is, they need to get it into muscle memory,” Pearson said. “If they get tired or sick they need to tell me. I have a great group of girls and they are very open and honest.”
One of the most difficult stunts, the Braced Baha, has Saiget up in the air, standing on the arm bases of two other cheerleaders.
“She bends over and grabs someone’s hands and those bases release her feet so she can flip over the top of the person’s hands she was holding. It is an upper-level stunt,” said Pearson.
The CHS squad took to heart advisories from the judges, so there are quite a few things they will be working on in advance of next year’s state competition.
“They gave us some really good pointers,” said Pearson. “You have to be able to whip your legs, keep your chest high and have the ability to jump high enough and still land on your feet. Having the proper landing with your feet together and keeping your chest high is an extremely difficult thing to do.”
This year, with a really young team, including brand new athletes, it did not shock their coach that they needed to work hard to improve their jumps.
“You can’t expect a freshman to be able to jump like a senior,” Pearson said.
Still, the coach found that “they did amazing.”
This story was updated on April 3 to include the cheer squad’s state competition placement.
