There's an old saying: "It's not how you start, but how you finish, that matters."
It seems like the Wildcat cheerleading squad was told the same thing this season after placing 2nd in State.
After finishing in 8th place at the Stevenson Invite to start the season, the team finished in 1st place four days later, beginning what would be a common theme of their season: inconsistency.
“Up until Sectionals, our competition season was really inconsistent," said senior Taylor Van Wagner. "We always joked about how we would do really well, then really bad, then really well again."
After their 1st place win at Stevenson, the squad finished 2nd at the Wauconda Invite. However, three days later at Conference, they took a rather large step backwards, finishing in 6th. They then finished even worse at the Grayslake North Invite a few days later.
"We kept getting lots of deductions, which placed us badly each time," said senior Paige Schlesinger.
Injuries also crippled the team early on in the season, with members suffering everything from concussions and torn ligaments to muscle strains.
And then something just clicked for the squad.
The team rebounded in a big way after its disappointing finish at Conference and Grayslake by finishing 1st at their Sectional meet, making them eligible for the State Finals at the US Cellular Colosseum in Bloomington.
"[Sectionals] was a moment of unity for the team," said senior Frances Skurski. "We hit our routine and brought energy to our performance."
After the bus trip from school down to Bloomington, the team was confident in its abilities. But there was also an undercurrent of nervousness felt among the team in the hours leading up to the first of two days of competition in Bloomington.
"The first day everyone was really nervous and expectant," said senior Craig Breckenridge "We all expected to make it to the second day, but we were still very jittery."
And those jitters were apparent after their first night of competition. The Wildcats barely squeaked into the next day of competition with a 9th-place finish. Only the top ten teams make it into the second day of competition.
The Wildcats' routine was the same routine they had performed at their other competitions this year, opening with some complicated tumbling, and followed by a combination of jumping, motions, a pyramid, cheer and a little dance--all within three minutes.
"Many people don't realize how hard our routines actually are," said senior Janessa Hedlund. "Compare them with doing a 3-minute sprint with weightlifting and yelling."
But similar to their season, the emotions went from an extremely nervous low after the first performance to a confident high before the second performance.
"The first day, we were all so nervous to compete," said Schlesinger. "The second day, we were just excited. ... We knew all the other teams were nervous, watching us, and we were psyching them out, which just pumped us up."
The pre-performance high carried over into the performance as well, which was good enough for a 2nd place finish and good enough to send the team into a frenzy that lasted the rest of the day Saturday into the following Monday's championship march at school.
"I can't even describe the feeling of being second in State," said Schlesinger. "It was a mix of every single positive emotion. Half of us were crying, some people were laughing, and others were jumping around hugging each other."
All the emotions and inconsistency aside, members on the team walked away with at least one steady feeling: that this season was a success.
"Getting second in State was one of the best experiences of my life," said Hedlund. "Although our team can drive each other crazy, we really are a family."
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