Though they had two coaches prior to the start of competitive season, the Staples girls’ cheerleading team has remained both poised and hungry to make it to regionals again.

“I really think the squad as a whole has great motivation to push ourselves hard and kill our routines in order to make it,” Jessica Nelson ’16 said.

However, after losing their coach just two weeks before the start of the competitive season, the girls had to make a decision.

The team was forced to make a choice: either sitback and watch their season disintegrate right before their eyes, or take action in the wake of a new coach in order to perform their best come championship season.

The team chose to stick it out.

“As a whole, we have really had to dig down deep and come together in order to perform our best,” Nelson said. “We were a little behind with our own coach, so we’re all pushing ourselves really hard to catch up and put ourselves in a position to succeed.”

Even though the team lost many cheerleaders, they were able to work past those obstacles, according to Sloane Cooper ’15.

“As a team we have had many struggles, including losing our seniors and gaining many new girls on the cheer team,” Cooper said. “So this year has been a little difficult, but we really just wanted to brush all of that off and work as a team to win FCIACS and hopefully states.”

The new head coach, Devin Zayas was introduced right before the start of the competitive winter season, making it really hard for the team to learn a successful routine on such short notice; however this did not dampen the mood, according to Liv Blevins ’15.

“It was definitely tough having to learn a brand new routine with a new coach in literally two weeks, but we love the new coaches and have been working really hard during practice to finish the routine in time for our first competition,” Blevins said.

In cheerleading, team chemistry is a vital necessity if you want to succeed.

Haley Burns ’16 believes that getting a new coach midway through the season has actually helped to bring the team closer.
“Getting a new coach actually brought the team closer because it was a problem we had to solve together,” Burns said.

Although you may have expected the aura of the team to be dampened by losing a coach, this was not the case.

In fact, it was far from it.

“Overall,” Cooper said, “”we just want to work our hardest and have fun as a team.”