In January 2013, I was living in the Scranton, Pa., area. I missed coaching, but was fascinated to find out that there were several small-college teams in the area headed to UCA College Nationals. My husband worked at the local newspaper, so I contacted the sports editor to see if I could string a story for him about it.
He wasn't interested. Neither was the features editor. I was even disappointed in the coverage some of the schools gave their own teams (though to be fair, some did a very good job). So I wrote it for my own blog, hoping it might, at least, go viral.
And that's one reason why I created The Megaphone. I'm hoping in some small way to provide some "cheers" for teams that get so little support.
So once again, here's a salute to NEPA's college cheer teams!
NEPA teams make national scene
Originally posted January 2013
Although college cheerleading's big-name teams -- Kentucky, Alabama, UCF -- are mostly in the south, a group of NEPA squads is quietly making waves on the national scene.
Misericordia University, Kutztown University, the University of Scranton and Keystone College all sent teams to Universal Cheerleaders Association's college national championships last weekend. Misericordia placed fourth in the all-girl open division and Kutztown also took fourth in all-girl division 1.
Scranton's cheer team, also competing in all-girl open, finished in the top 10, as did its dance team, also in its respective open division. Keystone placed in the top 10 in small coed division 2.
Misericordia freshman Alyssa Auer and Kutztown senior Talia Russell shared their experiences at nationals.
"Sharing a moment like finding out we made it to finals is indescribable," Auer said. "We were all so excited and absolutely thrilled that our hard work paid off to meet the goal we set to make it to finals!"
The Cougars were in the No. 5 spot heading into finals, Auer said, but reworked the cheer portion of their routine using the judges' input from semi-finals to make it more crowd-friendly. This helped them move up a spot in finals.
Kutztown also had a strong cheer portion in its routine.
"Our routine starts off with our high energy, exciting cheer that makes the fans want to cheer back with us," Russell, the team's president, said. "It's a great way to show our crowd effectiveness while getting the team pumped for the rest of the routine."
The Twitter account @UCAUpdates agreed, tweeting "Roar Bears! Fun routine from Kutztown University" during finals.
Another improvement Misericordia made was to clean up two stunt sequences. The opening stunt sequence -- a college rewind, heel stretch, waterfall out, and a front walkover into an aero and full down -- was one that the squad worked on since summer camp, Auer said, and "we nailed it in the end." Misericordia also added difficulty with a flip dismount from a pyramid sequence.
Kutztown relied on the strength of its practice sessions to carry the team through to a strong finals performance, Russell said.
"We had effective, high energy practices in the days leading up to the competition which enabled us to perform our routine the best we ever have during finals," she said. "Overall, I think the team became stronger as a whole and we were able to work together on the mat."
The practices may have been serious, but the Bears had fun throughout, Russell said.
"One of our main goals as a team this year was to stay focused and I think we achieved that goal while still being able to keep practices exciting," she said.
The key to the Cougars' success was team unity, Auer said, citing the leadership and encouragement of coaches Tara Sinclair and Courtney Coletti, senior captains Amber Schmidt and Alyssa McEntee -- the team's only seniors -- and junior captain Sarah Richards.
"Coming from a high school that doesn't compete, it was amazing to see all the dedication that it took to make our routine all that it was," Auer said. "Misericordia's cheerleading squad stresses the word 'family' and that's exactly what we are, cheer sisters."
Sunday, November 23, 2014
Tuesday, August 26, 2014
A hello cheer from The Megaphone!
Hello cheer world and blogosphere! This is The Megaphone, a blog dedicated to news about cheerleading squads and cheerleaders.
But wait, you say. There are already plenty of cheerleading news sites out there! Why another one?
What's different about The Megaphone is that it's here to tell the stories that aren't getting told. The cheerleading news sources out there are awesome. There's industry news, updates from competitions, the latest on uniforms, inspiring stories, how-tos... the list goes on.
But there are a lot of cheerleading squads out there who have interesting stories to tell that don't fit into any of the existing umbrellas. A lot of times, cheerleaders do great things and their local media ignores it. That's where The Megaphone comes in.
I'm not looking to compete with or step on the toes of any cheerleading news that's already out there. I have great respect for them -- in fact, I write for some of them. What I want to do is promote cheerleading squads -- as our description says, cheer for them "just a little louder!"
I've coached cheerleading for more than a decade, at various levels. One of my frustrations as a coach was always the lack of publicity for my teams. I had newspaper editors bluntly dismiss me when I called in or sent them information. Do cheerleaders cheer for publicity? No. But there were always some interesting stories about my teams and cheerleaders that rarely got told.
This also stems from my long-time tenure as a small college cheerleading coach. Between my experiences at two different schools, and observing the coverage (or lack thereof) squads in our conferences and division received from their schools, I have long wanted to give small college teams a spotlight as well. I mean no disrespect to sports information directors, because I actually served a term as interim SID at my alma mater, while coaching cheerleading, and I know that sports information departments are overworked and understaffed. When you have 20-plus varsity sports to deal with, your time is pretty well sewn up in those. Believe me, I understand that. However, I still want to see those squads get a taste of the spotlight.
I also want to give credit where credit is due. The Megaphone will highlight traditional media that does a great job of telling cheerleading stories.
How will I find these stories? Social media will help, as I will launch Twitter and Facebook accounts and follow cheer teams, and I'm hoping coaches will see The Megaphone as a resource. If you have a story you think needs to be told, email me at themegaphoneblog@gmail.com. (By the way, sorry this URL isn't intuitive -- themegaphone and megaphone were already taken!)
Cheers!
But wait, you say. There are already plenty of cheerleading news sites out there! Why another one?
What's different about The Megaphone is that it's here to tell the stories that aren't getting told. The cheerleading news sources out there are awesome. There's industry news, updates from competitions, the latest on uniforms, inspiring stories, how-tos... the list goes on.
But there are a lot of cheerleading squads out there who have interesting stories to tell that don't fit into any of the existing umbrellas. A lot of times, cheerleaders do great things and their local media ignores it. That's where The Megaphone comes in.
I'm not looking to compete with or step on the toes of any cheerleading news that's already out there. I have great respect for them -- in fact, I write for some of them. What I want to do is promote cheerleading squads -- as our description says, cheer for them "just a little louder!"
I've coached cheerleading for more than a decade, at various levels. One of my frustrations as a coach was always the lack of publicity for my teams. I had newspaper editors bluntly dismiss me when I called in or sent them information. Do cheerleaders cheer for publicity? No. But there were always some interesting stories about my teams and cheerleaders that rarely got told.
This also stems from my long-time tenure as a small college cheerleading coach. Between my experiences at two different schools, and observing the coverage (or lack thereof) squads in our conferences and division received from their schools, I have long wanted to give small college teams a spotlight as well. I mean no disrespect to sports information directors, because I actually served a term as interim SID at my alma mater, while coaching cheerleading, and I know that sports information departments are overworked and understaffed. When you have 20-plus varsity sports to deal with, your time is pretty well sewn up in those. Believe me, I understand that. However, I still want to see those squads get a taste of the spotlight.
I also want to give credit where credit is due. The Megaphone will highlight traditional media that does a great job of telling cheerleading stories.
How will I find these stories? Social media will help, as I will launch Twitter and Facebook accounts and follow cheer teams, and I'm hoping coaches will see The Megaphone as a resource. If you have a story you think needs to be told, email me at themegaphoneblog@gmail.com. (By the way, sorry this URL isn't intuitive -- themegaphone and megaphone were already taken!)
Cheers!
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