Bellarmine cheer prepares for nationals
The Bellarmine cheer team is set to travel back to the National Cheer Association & National Dance Association Collegiate Cheer and Dance Championships with hopes to win another national championship. The team will drive to Daytona, Florida, the first week of April to compete.
“The team has worked on the stunts for over four months now. We are fully prepared to do whatever we need to do to bring home some hardware again,” assistant coach Houston Wood said.
The team made history by winning the program's first national championship in 2019 with its first-place finish in the Intermediate Small Coed Division II competition of the NCA & NDA college championship.
Bellarmine will compete for three days and perform two different routines both days. The first routine consists of backflips and two 360-degree twists called inversion fulls. The second routine features three women being tossed in the air by the bottom nine women; with the three fully rotating while switching the feet on which they land. This known as a half-up switch up high to high.
Junior Katie Kernan said the competition is the most exhilarating experience she has ever had. “Being a part of a team that has had so much great success in the past is great. I want to be able to write my name in the record books as well,” she said.
2020 was a complete loss because the pandemic canceled the tournament. “The most devastating part of the entire year was seeing everyone’s face after we found out the tournament was canceled. The girls worked so hard and seeing them so down was by far the worst moment of my entire Bellarmine career,” senior Madison Lauter said.
After losing a year of competition, the team followed its historic run by placing third in its first year competing at the Division 1 level in 2021.
The squad starts the 17-hour bus ride to the competition April 5 and will return April 10. The team will compete against Kennesaw State, College of Charleston, Southern University and DePaul University.
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