By Stephen Smoot
They work on the sidelines to make sure that the athletes get the appreciation and support they need. Meanwhile, they also work on honing their own individual skills to create a precise product through diligent teamwork.
The team that cheers on everyone else now gets to bask in the glow of having Pendleton County once again cheer for them. On Wednesday, the Pendleton County High School Wildcat cheer squad went to state competition for the second consecutive year.
On senior night, the pride taken in going to state last year marked the “best memory” of the senior cheerleaders as they were introduced and recognized alongside football seniors. That team went to states for the first time in more than two decades.
The team qualified through winning their region in competition at Lincoln High School in Harrison County earlier this month. The cheerleaders took home the regional title, earning a place in Charleston to compete against the rest of the best in West Virginia.
Competition opened at the Charleston Civic Center. Class AA opened up first with Class A following right after. Pendleton County performed last among all Class A squads, giving them a slight advantage over the field. Awards took place between the close of Class A and AA competition and the opening of Class AAA and AAAA in the afternoon.
According to the West Virginia Secondary Schools Activities Commission’s cheer manual, competitions are conducted by a panel of a minimum of five judges. Rules limit communication with coaches and even, at times, with each other. The manual offers both hard and fast rules, as well as suggestions such as “do not allow crowd reactions to influence judging scores” and “keep a positive facial expression.”
Each team can either be awarded or also sanctioned points during competition. Squads that suffer a rules or safety related error can lose 20 per violation.
Either five or 10 points get awarded per category when judging execution. This includes dance execution (five), dance difficulty (five), tumbling execution (10), tumbling difficulty (five), stunt execution (10), stunt difficulty (five), choreography and creativity (formerly “overall appeal until 2021) (10), expression, spirit, and showmanship, (10), and overall effect (10).
A very specific rubric guides judges in determining the appropriate scores for appropriate individual and team execution in the manual, complete with photographs of each example.
In Charleston, Pendleton County saw a very familiar opponent in the Mountain Lions of Tucker County. Others who competed in Class A included Clay-Battelle, Man, Mount View, Wheeling Central, Tug Valley, and Richwood.
Man won the Class A title last year.
