HS CHEER: Lady Buffs 'have what it takes' in preparation for state competition
Nov. 12—McAlester cheer pumps up the crowd under Friday night lights — and will be taking center stage on Saturday.
Senior captains Brinley Lewis and Gabbi Anderson have been involved in cheerleading since they were young children. But now, they're helping lead their fellow Lady Buffs on the sidelines and into competition.
"For me, it's the atmosphere. Because it's about being excited and being a team, and you get to be yourself," Lewis said.
"It's nice that people can see 'gosh, they're actually leading the crowd' and stuff," Anderson added. "And also, just being a team is a really good part of it too."
The Lady Buffs will be traveling to Moore on Saturday to compete in the Oklahoma Secondary Schools Activities Association Game Day State Competition, and Lewis said that she's simultaneously excited and nervous to hit the mat with her teammates.
"I'm excited. I'm nervous, obviously. Because you get about three minutes. You work for months for about a three-minute performance," Lewis said. "And we have no ability to come back from it. So that is a little nerve-wracking, because with other sports, if you go down the first half of the game, you have another half to work yourself back up.
"But I think we're prepared," she added. "I think we've got what it takes, for sure."
Anderson agreed with the sentiment of how hard McAlester has worked to prepare for this moment, and said she believes the Lady Buffs are going to make the most out of their opportunities.
"We also know what to expect from it. We know what you do for these three minutes is what you put out there. And we've worked for a long while, since summer," she said. "We know what we need to do and what needs to be done."
The pair admitted that there are plenty of nerves that come before McAlester hits the mat for competition, and between Lewis and Anderson, there are two very different styles on how they approach the butterflies.
"I try and talk to the girls. You can feel the difference between 'I'm anxious because I'm excited' and 'I'm anxious because I'm terrified,'" Lewis said. "So I try to tell them this is it, it's about having fun. Don't worry about what anyone's saying, don't worry about other teams. I try to almost make them put on blinders."
"I like it when the girls get me to laugh or something, because I'm normally stiff as a board," Anderson laughed. "And then when somebody says something funny, we all burst out laughing and it's like 'okay, I can relax.'"
Both seniors talked of how close knit the team is, and how they do a great job of lifting one another up. And as McAlester looks to continue and advance its place in the world of competitive cheerleading, Anderson said it's been a long journey to get to this point.
"From freshman year to now, there's definitely a lot of ups and downs," Anderson said.
But as Lewis pointed out, each class of Lady Buffs is making its mark on the program, and leaving it better and stronger with each and every passing season.
"Our freshman year was the first time we've ever done this kind of competition. So we're the first group to go through four years of it," Lewis said. "It was a lot of taking what we've done before, and reflecting on it, and coming back and trying to do better."
Contact Derek Hatridge at dhatridge@mcalesternews.com.
