Despite the Stillwater Chevals Dance team losing 14 seniors from last year who made a very positive impact on the dance team, they know they are moving onward and still putting on performances. The graduates have now moved on to college.
The team definitely knew they were going to get smaller due to 14 seniors leaving the team. These were some of the original Chevals, lots of them played a huge role in getting people to join and got the team up to 40 people. Since they were the “original start to the team”, it was especially hard to let them go but each year they gained new people and new freshmen and the Chevals gained a new group of girls this fall season.
“It’s definitely shrunk quite a bit, but we also gained a lot more girls. So it has been fun to have new people come in and join and learn the ropes(of the team),” Senior Ella Milby said.
“I feel like the hype died down since losing the seniors. I also feel like a lot of connection with the students outside of Chevals kind of went down,” Junior Hollie Koller added.
Due to the number of people who have graduated and left the team, Head Coach Kenzie Coyle decided it would be easier to make the number of captains and leaders smaller. The captains this year also claim it is easier to have fewer captains on the team. It would also give the seniors this year an opportunity to show good leadership and be the captains.
“I think having three captains in addition to a senior leadership team has helped our team this year. I think providing leadership opportunities outside of captainship has been a better option than having a large group of captains,” Coyle said.
Coyle decided to let juniors and seniors be a part of the “senior leadership team.” Koller is their game-day adviser. She has a huge role to play during performance days.
It gives her a chance to show her leadership on the team as well as help out. She has only been a part of the team for 2 years.
“I am game day advisor, so I help out with Game days when we’re performing at halftime. I help lead stretches and set formations on the field. I just kind of help out the coaches on those days. Because it can be really stressful. A captain’s job is to assist the team every single day and they answer questions and they help teach the dances sometimes. Then on the leadership team we help out on specific things on specific days,” Koller said.
Even though she had already graduated, last year’s senior McKenna Hinck decided to come back and help coach. Hinck was on the team for 4 years and decided that she loved the team so much she would come back and coach her team. Coyle loves that she came back to help and claims that it is easier to coach when she has more help.
“I think McKenna brings a unique perspective having just graduated from being a part of the team. She brings a lot of new ideas and is a great asset to our team,” Coyle said.
The Chevals are also all close to one another. They consider the gym a “family” and the girls on the team are always welcoming to new girls joining and who want to join the Chevals. They compete in competitions and have three levels for the competition team. But the fall team is just for fun and they perform at halftime at the varsity football home games.
The Chevals have at least one more performance on Oct. 13 at the home football game, and if the football team goes into playoffs they will have more performances coming soon. But after those final performances, Chevals head into tryouts for the winter competition team.
