The cheerleaders at Mooresville High School hit 8th in Nationals.
The National High School Cheer-leading Championship is the largest high school cheer-leading competition in the country. It brought hundreds of schools and thousands of cheerleaders in many different rounds in each division. The team competed in the semi-final round on Friday, February 9 and advanced to the final round, which took place on Sunday, February 11. They have worked since June practicing this routine and participating in 4 other competitions to prep for Nationals.They came in with a score of 75.5 out of 100 in semi-finals and a 76.1 out of 100 in finals.
Nationals is the last competition of the year. The season is officially over and they will be holding tryouts in March for next year’s season. With two days of practice each week, they worked hard and were committed. The team shares unity when practicing and builds up communication with one another. They had a celebration event at Hollywood Studios on Sunday night and the team went together to enjoy themselves before traveling back to Indiana the next morning.
This was the 5th time Mooresville has made it to Nationals, but only the first time they have advanced to finals. They were all incredibly nervous as they all patiently waited to hear if they advanced or not, especially since the team was the second to last name to be called. The excitement was through the roof, and the seniors were incredibly emotional. They’ve worked very hard to get to that point. Both of the performances had zero deductions.
“At awards, we were just so thankful to be there and were so grateful when we were named 8th. I couldn’t be more proud of or thankful for this group! I’ve been coaching for 15 years at Mooresville and we’ve had a lot of firsts in that time, but this is definitely a milestone that none of us will ever forget. It takes so much time, effort, and commitment to compete against the best teams in the country and I’m so proud of everything this team pushed through to get to this point,” Coach Katie Greathouse said.
Junior Liz Huffman shares her thoughts on this accomplishment.
“I love performing with everyone and especially the seniors. I love the support from coaches parents and the school. I love the feeling before we take the stage and the nerves come together and then we hit a good routine and there is so much relief. All the hard work pays off,” Huffman said.
Senior Eden Carnahan says being a finalist feels kind of sad because the cheer team is growing and getting better, and it is her last year here.
“We have a lot of support from Mr. Upton because he is required to go to nationals with them but he shows he wants to be there with much spirit and support,” Carnahan said.
“It is sweet to hear they could see my genuine interest in their performances. I am extremely proud of them. Anyone who goes to the event can see there are thousands of competitors there and hundreds of schools from all over the country. Simply to make it is a huge honor but to make it to the finals is an even bigger accomplishment. They represented Mooresville HS and the community as a whole perfectly. It was likely the last year that I will be able to attend with them and it was a great group to end things with. I will miss this senior group but I also know we have some amazing underclassmen that I am looking forward to watching in the years to come,” Principal Wes Upton said.
