Sports

Cheerleading: Experienced squad seeking a top-five finish

Colin Baumgartner

The team will head north to kickoff the season this weekend.
Photo by Nick Couretas.

December 12,
2007 - The Lake
Orion cheerleading
program is on solid ground.

Well, except for some of their stunt round. But that's part of the routine.

Coach Nancy DeAvila enters her sixth season as the
varsity head coach. She was selected as regional coach of the year last
season.

The squad finished sixth at last year's Division I state meet and would like
to improve on that result this season. Their highest ever finish was fourth,
achieved last in 2002.

Their season
gets underway this Saturday in the Competitive Cheer Coaches Association of
Michigan's (CCCAM) Scholarship Invitational at Mount Pleasant High
School.

"Usually we don't compete until after the winter break, but the last
couple of years we've chosen to do this early season competition," DeAvila said, adding that the team will have an
opportunity to be judged five times in one day as a result.

"We decided, as a team, that if we're going to compete this early, we
want to take advantage and get judged as many times as possible," she
added.

The 36-member team has 21 returnees, and includes nine seniors and five
freshmen.

The senior captains, as elected by the team, are Hannah Knight, Jen Walters,
Haley Willick and Tiffany Stubbs.

"We have about the same number of returning seniors, but overall a
little more returning experience," DeAvila
noted.

"They're extremely talented," she added. "And I would say this
team works harder than any other I've ever coached."

She said the coaching staff decided to challenge the team with a harder
schedule this year.

"We felt they were a more talented group than any team we've had and I
felt it was my responsibility, as a coach, to give them everything I could
possibly give them to help them get to the next level."

The team shared the OAA I league title with eventual state champion Rochester last year and
would like to build on that result.

"In our case, we have the best of the very best to push us," she
said. "There's no program in the state that's better than the Rochester program. To
match their level of competitive effort is what everybody reaches to achieve.
Our team definitely sets them as the standard."

The Dragons will see Rochester
many times throughout the season, including the two
OAA I Jamborees in January and the league meet in early February.

Rochester edged
LO in the two jamborees last season, while the Dragons took the league meet.
It was one of two times Lake Orion beat Rochester
last season.

"I think you put stock into the fact that you beat them because now it's
an attainable goal," DeAvila said. "On
the other hand, you can't rest on your laurels, because this is a different team."

"In some ways it's a stronger team and in some ways they still have
things to work out," she added.

The Dragons will host regionals again this season,
in addition to the annual Lake Orion Invitational, one of the biggest meets
of the year, on Jan. 26.

"For people who don't know anything about competitive cheer, they
couldn't pick a better competition to come and watch," DeAvila said.