Rebecca Jacobsen – Staff Writer 

On the weekend of Feb. 2 and 3, the dance and cheer teams participated in their first two competitions of the season at Midland University and Doane University in Nebraska. Both competitions were successful and the dance and cheer teams are in strong positions for the rest of the season.  

Dance captain and senior Aubrey Hill attributes the success of their first competitions to the team’s camaraderie and coach Mel Knobloch’s positive words before their performances. Knobloch relaxed the team by giving them space, to focus on elements of the competition other than achieving the highest score.  

“Competitions can be stressful because there’s a lot on the line for two minutes. Our coach said to us…‘I don’t care how you do, I’m going to love you regardless,’” Hill said. “We want to win and we want to do well, but we’re just going to have fun because it’s what we love to do. I think that’s why it went so well, it’s the attitudes and the atmosphere we had this year, which is a good way to start.” 

Another factor that contributes to the teams’ success is the timing of competitions. In previous years, competitions would occur every weekend. This year, the dance and cheer teams have two competitions, every other weekend – one on Friday and another one close by on Saturday. 

Although this can be tiring, the gap between competitions enables the teams to have consistently strong performances at competitions. They then get two weeks, rather than one, to make any necessary changes or improvements to their routine.  

Junior Natasha Sampson has been competing on both the cheer and dance team since her freshman year. She appreciates not having to worry about making big changes to their routines between the two competitions. She also loves the competitive and unified feeling of competition days.  

“It’s kind of a cool atmosphere amongst the different colleges,” Sampson said. “Also, I think it brings us together as a team because we’re working towards this one goal of going and competing successfully. It’s a good bonding time for all of us.”  

Although the competition season just started, the dance and cheer teams have been practicing and performing at football halftimes since the fall semester. Several members are battling injuries, especially with the long season length. 

A challenge unique to the sports of dance and cheer is the subjectivity of the scoring. Each competition’s scores are based on a group of judges’ opinions. These opinions change from judge to judge and from day to day. Even if the team feels they have had their best performance, it is possible that their score won’t reflect that because of how a particular judge perceived the performance on that day. Although this can be difficult for both teams to process, Knobloch chooses to combat it with positivity and a growth mindset. 

“Out of every obstacle and challenge, there’s a positive that comes out of it,” Knobloch said. Instead of just being complacent and staying where we’re at, maybe that lower score pushes us to the next level instead and gets us more motivated. [I’m just] putting that positive spin on everything, trying to find the lesson and the learning point in it, and being able to use that and adapt it for the next week.” 

The next competition for the dance and cheer teams takes place on Febr. 9 at Crown Classic at York University, followed by the Concordia Duals at Concordia University on Feb. 10.