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Chelsea Davis (l) and Danielle Ulrich help Beth Golembiewski off the ground
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The final whistle ends the football season in November. The last buzzer sounds on the basketball hardwood in February. Soccer players leave the field in late fall and grapplers play their last game in March. But there’s one high school team that never seems to stop.
Cheerleading is a year-round sport with year-round athletes. At Peters Township, it isn’t your mother’s cheerleading squad. A good cheerleader has a wide repertoire of skills, including precision movements, gymnastics and tumbling, lifting and dancing abilities.
“Cheerleading is just like any other sport,” says varsity cheerleading coach Jen DeFrancesco. “We absolutely put in the same amount of work and time. We get injuries, maybe worse than others, because sometimes we’re falling from two stories high.”
The Peters Township High School squad cheers at football, soccer, wrestling and basketball games. During a five-day stretch late last year, the team cheered at four hoops games and a wrestling match. Over the course of the season, the squad turns out at nearly 70 games – that’s close to a full NHL or NBA season. “It’s a full-time commitment to be on this team,” DeFrancesco says.
And she knows. DeFrancesco was captain of her cheerleading squad at Penn State-Behrend. This is the first year for DeFrancesco and fellow coach Melanie Gaebel at Peters. “These girls put a lot of work into this,” DeFrancesco says. “They deserve credit just like all other athletes.”
Try-outs for the Peters Township squad are held in April or May. The varsity group carries 26 girls, the junior varsity group 28. The squad takes part in summer camps and two-a-day workouts and, once the school year starts, practices are held several days per week. “It’s a commitment,” says captain Beth Golembiewski, a senior. “We work our butts off, four days a week, two hours each night.”
This kind of extra-curricular intensity could put even the friendliest person in a grouchy mood — a big no-no in cheerleading circles.
“You have to be personable on top of all that,” Beth says with a laugh.
Cheerleading’s Origins
The beginnings of American cheerleading date back to the late 1880s, but it wasn’t until the 1930s that pom-poms were introduced, and squads incorporated tumbling and gymnastics into their routines. “It reached its largest audiences in the 1970s,” says Karen Coates of the World Cheerleading Association. “That also was the beginning of collegiate and high school cheerleading competitions, and more universities began offering scholarships and college credits to cheerleaders at that time, too.”
High school and college squads, Coates says, are as important off the field as they are on it. “Cheerleaders have consistently demonstrated that they’re among the most important school leadership groups,” she says. “Teams always take part in service projects and promote positive attitudes and school spirit within the community.”
But it takes more than spirit alone to be a cheerleader. It takes strength, both mental and physical.
Warm-ups consist of backflips, kicks, stretches, vaults and lifts. Tricky-looking heel-stretches and stunts such as liberties and pyramids are all part of today’s flashy routines.
“It can be dangerous if they are not strong and don’t know the techniques,” coach Gaebel says. “There is an element of strength involved, but we wouldn’t be putting them out there if we didn’t know they could do it. Balance is everything.”
Including balancing a hectic schedule.
“I don’t really have a social life,” says cheerleading captain Ali Olivo. “I’ve had practice every day this week… most of my friends, though, are in cheerleading, so I see them a lot.
Beth agrees. “Weekends are for friends,” she says. “I try to make time for it all, but I really love the sport, it’s fun and energetic.”
And it’s that energy that keeps the squad going. Ali, a senior, says the squad can feed off a supportive crowd. High school football games are a Friday night institution in Western Pennsylvania, and stadium atmospheres and cheerleaders go hand-in-hand. But the sports (basketball, wrestling and soccer) calling the smaller venues and gyms home can provide just as much fan interaction. High school basketball games often attract boisterous crowds and Ali says last year’s soccer games — the team advanced to the WPIAL Class AAA championship for the second time in two years — drew strong support.
“It’s great when the fans are into it,” Ali says. “We have a lot of support from parents and students.”
Beth and Ali also are part of Peters Township’s competition team, an intensely competitive activity focused squarely on the cheerleading squad. The competition team comes up with a high-tempo routine and performs that routine in competition with other cheerleading squads. Competitions start in November, around the time football season winds down and in that little window before the hardwood season begins. The team is taking part in the Robert Morris cheer competition this month. In February, they’ll compete at the Nationals in Columbus, Ohio.
Everything needs to be coordinated. It can be tough work. “In the middle of one routine I couldn’t breathe,” Ali says. “But we’re practicing it, we’ll be ready.”
DeFrancesco says the season has gone well, and she has designs to implement more of a training program next season. “It’s an all-year sport,” she says. “We do just as much as other athletes.”
