The Yelm High School cheerleading team is set to party at the state competition in Battle Ground in January, and it only took one performance of their game day routine to qualify in the 4A level.
That has never happened before, head coach Madison Hummel said.
The Tornados debuted their game day routine at the Carnival Classic at North Thurston High School on Saturday, Nov. 23, and scored a 79.3 despite needing only 70 to earn a state-qualifying score. Yelm placed second out of 10 teams in the competition.
Yelm’s routine had four elements: a situational cheer for offense or defense, a school-specific cheer, the school fight song and a band dance. For the band dance segment, the girls danced to Aqua’s “Barbie Girl,” and the judges raved about the team’s pom switch where they put their red pom poms down and pulled pink pom poms from the back of their skirts.
“My girls really wanted it. Last year, we had some struggles as a whole for our game day groups,” Hummel said. “My returners really pushed like, ‘Guys, this is important. We need to work just as hard at this as we do anything else.’ My kids are really bought into it because they’re having fun doing it.”
The Tornados have a different energy compared with last year, as the squad often struggled with personnel for game day routines, stunts and with switching up routines late in the year. Despite those bumps, Yelm placed fourth in the 3A state game day division last winter. “Barbie Girl” is partially to thank for their excitement, as the girls have rallied around the lyric, “Come on Barbie, let’s go party.”
“We’re taking it as Yelm is going to party. When we qualified, we were all posting [to social media] that we were gonna party so hard at state,” senior captain Coral Ogle. “We’re really bringing that energy to every single competition. It just hypes us all up.”
Yelm has competed in two cheer competitions so far this season, but the Carnival Classic was its first game day competition. The Tornados opened the competition season with a trip to Graham-Kapowsin High School on Nov. 16 for the Eagle Cheer Extravaganza to perform a traditional routine.
As of now, they’re set to compete in the game day division in the 4A state competition in Battle Ground on Saturday, Jan. 25, but they can still qualify for the traditional division competition, held the day before.
With two more competitions to go and numerous YHS sporting events left until then, Hummel wants her team to focus on improving with every practice and competition and listening to the judges’ feedback. She and her team believe they have something to prove every time they hit the mat, especially after a grueling season last year.
“The competitive cheerleading world is such a tight thing where everybody knows who everyone is. When people see you struggle, they associate that struggle with you always,” Hummel said. “My returners and my two captains, especially, have instilled in all the new people that, ‘We want you guys to want this as bad as we do.’ We stand on that. We have something to prove.”
Senior captains Ogle and Brooklyn Martin are motivated to finish in the top three at state in their final season, especially at the 4A classification.
“We want to give it our all for the last time that we have. We’re putting everything into it and setting everybody else up for next year,” Martin said. “It’s definitely nerve racking, but that just comes with the sport. You’re gonna be against hard teams no matter what. We use that as motivation to push ourselves to be better.”
The Tornados will next compete at the Spirit of Northshore at Bothell High School on Saturday, Dec. 21 followed by the Harbor Cheerfest at Gig Harbor High School on Saturday, Jan. 11.
