Rio Scarcelli, Editor in Chief
After placing first for WPIAL competition and second in PIAA state finals, the Penn-Trafford cheer team got their final victory of the season in Orlando by placing ninth in the nation and making P-T cheer history in the process during the Feb. 7 weekend.
While their successes were out in the open, it was the hard work and dedication behind the scenes that got the girls to achieve their milestone.
After the football season comes to a close, the girls do more than cheer at the basketball games. Beginning mid-September and ending in February, any of the girls from the varsity or JV team interested can attend tryouts for their competitive team.
Practices and clinics begin over the summer for the competitive team, which does not include the sessions they must attend for the regular season.
The team is comprised of 30 girls: 20 on their mat team and an additional 10 on their game day team.
“Mat is the more traditional routine when you think of competition cheer,” said Britney Merola, a senior on the competitive game day cheer team. “It has elite stunts, tumbling and dancing.”
Katie Bacco, a senior from the mat team, elaborated on this.
“The routine lasts a total of two and a half minutes and consists of difficult stunts, a pyramid, running and standing tumbling, dance and crowd engagement-cheer,” Bacco explained.
Merola said the game-day team had just been introduced last year.
“It is a routine that is split into four parts and focuses on crowd engagement,” she stated. Much of what can be seen from the cheerleaders at football games and pep rallies are showcased with the game day team during the competition.
With the four routines consisting of a band dance, a situational sideline chant, cheer and fight song, and occasional stunts, the game day team dips into almost every element that would be seen at football games.
The girls practice various times throughout the week on Sunday nights, Mondays, Wednesdays and occasional Fridays.
“As nationals approached, we practiced every day after school. Sunday practices became longer and Saturday morning practices were added into our busy schedule,” Bacco explained.
From Friday, Feb. 7 through the results announced Sunday, Feb. 9, both teams worked hard on their routines with the mat team advancing through prelims and semifinals into the final competition.
Bacco attributes part of their success to the trust that they have as a team.
“It is especially crucial in cheerleading because there is a lot of trust that goes into it,” she said. “We are putting girls into the air and they are supposed to trust that we will not let anything happen to them if something goes wrong.”
This kind of bond helped the team grow and reach their best potential, Bacco added.
The cheer team is no stranger to nationals competition as last year, their 6th place position in states earned them a spot for the first time and brought them to 10th place overall in nationals.
“My freshman year, we did not make it past the preliminary round at states. Being the state runner-up my senior year truly shows just how much and how quickly this program grew,” remarked Bacco.
Continuing to one-up themselves, P-T’s team took their second-place spot in states and worked diligently to score ninth overall. This means that, out of a 100 point score ranking, they performed their routine more accurately with fewer mistakes to get deducted for.
Merola and Bacco explained that they set team and individual goals at the beginning of the year and wrote them down on posters that would be displayed at every practice. This helped as a motivating tool to get them to the heights they were able to achieve within this past season.
“It is an incredible feeling to be able to go out and compete against tas from all over the state and all over the country to make a name for P-T,” Bacco said.