The University of Maine cheer team began workouts last September unsure if it would complete its season as COVID-19 circulated around the Orono campus, the community and the rest of the world.
Normally, the team would focus its efforts on leading Black Bear fans in cheers during home football and basketball games. But with home games a rarity and no fans allowed, those opportunities vanished.
Then there was the matter of avoiding the pandemic, no easy task for any group, no matter the precautions taken.
But the 22-member squad overcame myriad challenges to capture the 2021 National Cheerleaders Association Intermediate All-Girl Division I Virtual National Championship.
The title was the second in six years for UMaine, which also won it all at Daytona Beach, Florida, in 2016 and finished second in 2018 and third in 2019. Last year’s event was canceled due to the coronavirus.
“Every athlete’s goal is to win, to come out on top and bring home a trophy for their school,” said Ashley Ouellette, one of four seniors on the squad. “That recognition is what drives competitive teams to practice and get better every day, and bringing home first place my senior year will be something I will always remember.”
The Black Bears didn’t start practices until the start of the fall semester, more than a month later than normal, and initially were limited to small-group workouts in the interest of social distancing.
“It was probably two months before I had them all in the same room at the same time,” head coach Jewels Watson said. “We didn’t do our first stunt in the air until about the week before Thanksgiving.
She said the team was months behind in its training.
“It typically takes us nine to 10 months to fully be prepared for nationals. This year we did it in three months at most,” Watson said.
The condensed time frame required some adjustments in how the team planned out its routine.
“Anything I threw at them, they could do,” Watson said. “It wasn’t a matter of talent or skill, we based our routine around what was going to be realistic for us to do with a quarter of the training time.”
Choosing elements that ensured the team members’ safety was a key dynamic.
“I didn’t want to push it too far and have injuries,” she said.
The team had to adapt to wearing face coverings while training for and performing its 2-minute, 15-second routine.
“When you’re doing a routine you’re breathing heavy, you’re exhausted, you’re flipping upside down, and you’re having to keep a mask on your face. It made it very difficult,” Watson said.
The Black Bears didn’t completely escape the coronavirus. UMaine led its division after the virtual preliminary competition that was videotaped in early March and was working toward its presentation for the finals when one team member contracted COVID-19.
The team’s only case of the year required the Black Bears to quarantine for 10 days before completing their championship-round video.
“Physically, the shutdown made it a little harder because they hadn’t really done anything during the quarantine, they just stayed in their rooms,” Watson said. “On the flip side, they were so incredibly thankful that they had only one case all year.”
The team returned to practice on April 1, quickly regrouped and by April 6 completed its video to send off to the contest judges.
“Every single second of every single day throughout the season it was uncertain as to whether or not we’d be able to continue,” Watson said. “Until I hit ‘Submit’ on that last finals video, or really until I finished recording it, there was no certainty that anything was going to play out.”
The Black Bears scored 93.65 points to edge runner-up Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville (91.3) and third-place University of Illinois-Chicago (89.5).
“Being able to look back and see everything we overcame, whether it was a shortened season, competing virtually or dealing with exposures and quarantines, makes the win so much better,” senior Jordan Merchant said.
Merchant and Ouellette were joined on the squad by seniors Samantha Reilly and Maddie Demoranville and juniors Brianna Frey, Antonia Rosati, Megan Wright, Caroline Collins, Kaycie Groom, Hope Ouellette, Cammie Pierce, Maggie Belleau and Josie Criscione. The group also included sophomore Jenna Voteur, freshmen Grace DeSimone, Audrey Sutton, Sarah Mihalchik, Anna Brown, Kelsey White and Lindsay Clements, and alternates Morgan Inman and Emma Whitney.
“I couldn’t have asked for more dedicated teammates,” Demoranville said. “Even with the restrictions and setbacks we faced, the best part of the season was going to practice every night and knowing that everyone was doing their best. This team will always have my heart.”
