Michael Wilson

Sports Editor

mhwuilson@valdosta.edu

The VSU Red Hots and the co-ed cheerleading team won national titles at the 2009 NCA/NDA Collegiate Cheer and Dance Championship.  This year’s national championship for the Red Hots makes it back to back titles in the DII Dance Open championship, while the co-ed cheer team has claimed their first national title in team history.
The Red Hots are not strangers to being on top of the DII dancing world, but according to junior Brittany Lord, this year’s experiences meant a lot more to the team.
“This year we all had to go on the stage and we didn’t know our scores,” Lord said. “Last year they gave you your score after you danced, so you knew who won before the award ceremony. But this year they didn’t do that, they waited until the award ceremony. So when they were calling out the scores we were just real nervous. That was probably the most rewarding part because they called us at the end and it was in front of everybody.”
While the team enjoyed the sweet moments after being announced as the 2009 national champions, the season leading up to that moment can only be described as bitter.
The team lost seven dancers over the course of the season for various reasons. The team was forced to cope with the loss throughout the season, but the team suffered a huge blow when three veteran Red Hots, including the captain, left the team just a month before the national championship.
Senior Maggie Woodard, the new team captain, believes that the team really pulled together in order to be competitive in the championships.
“We went back and had to redo a lot of our formations and a lot of the new girls had to step up and take roles they hadn’t normally taken,” Woodard said.
Those rookie dancers did what was required of them to get back to a place where this year’s Red Hots could have an opportunity to win again. The team, as a whole, came together after the loss of those key veterans and made it back to the championship, where the team posted an 8.906 score and beat the next closest team, Tarleton State University, by .412.
The team did what it took throughout the season and repeated as DII Dance Open national champions, and if good things come in threes, then it makes perfect sense for the VSU co-ed cheerleading squad to follow suit and bring home a national championship of their own.
The co-ed team posted the highest score, 9.380, of any VSU cheerleading squad in history and clinched the DII Small Co-ed national championship by .228 over Blinn College.
The co-ed team went up against the perennial power Hawaii Pacific University, who scored a lackluster 8.473, and Blinn College, who proved to be the only true challenger for the team. The Blazers suffered a minor setback when they were deducted .05 points in the finals, but survived the loss of points.
Blinn College, HPU, and in-state opponent GCSU also suffered point deductions in the finals.
The All-Girls cheerleading team also competed in the national championships and finished in third place, 8.730, behind first place HPU, 8.895, and second place, 8.807.
The Blazers cheerleading program has made large strides in the right direction over the past few years and now one of the teams has added its own hardware to the highly decorated halls of VSU.
The Red Hots and the Cheerleading teams are proud of their collective accomplishments, and the two programs have respect for each other and enjoy competing and winning on the national level together. Fields feels a strong connection between the programs, which she is happy to be a part of.
“We are one big family, cheer and dance,” Fields said.
And now that family has something to celebrate—well,  two somethings.