Predicting a banner season

Pittsburg State University head cheerleading coach Linda Graham doesn’t want to build too much excitement about the upcoming season.

But watching Graham bound around the gym and holler lovingly at her team during practice in the Weede Center Wednesday night — “Absorb! You’ve got to absorb! (clapping vigorously) There you go!” — it’s obvious she thinks she might have the makings of a special season on her hands.

“This could be the best group of guys Pitt State has ever had,” said Graham, who coached the Gorilla Spirit Squad to a Division II National Championship in 2001. That expectation, she said, stems not only from an experienced core of returning squad members from as far away as Texas, but also from a crop of talented freshmen she said are progressing at an impressive pace.

But talent alone won’t take this group to the heights Graham thinks it can reach. Like any team activity, group dynamics are an integral cog in the wheel of success. Graham said she especially liked the “potential talent and enthusiasm of this young squad,” and was impressed at the ease with which they gelled into a trusting, family-like group.

“It’s like traveling with a bunch of clowns,” Graham said. “It’s their own fraternity and sorority rolled into one.”

Success, according to Graham, begins up front. Much like an offensive line in football, cheerleading needs a solid cast of horses down low to make the pyramids, baskets (where a cheer leader is flipped into the air and caught in a “basket” of arms) and twists (similar to a basket, but the flipper performs a complete twist) work. College cheerleading, unlike high school cheering, often employs men to anchor the foundation of formations. Some schools have trouble recruiting enough men, but Graham said she hasn’t had any trouble; her squad has 14 men and 15 women.

To some it might seem that all they do is stand around and hold up the cheerleaders. But the task requires more skill than might be obvious at first glance. Many of Graham’s “meatheads,” as she affectionately refers to them, are former high school and college athletes who are in top physical shape. Physical training is part of their practice regimen three times a week, and they work out on their own the other two days.

“They do a lot of circuit leg work and also work a lot on their core and back,” student coach Travis Faught said as he looked around the weight room. Faught played basketball in college before enrolling at Pitt State as a graduate student. Many of them had never cheered before, Faught said, and had to learn on the fly.

Skill is an important factor as well, Graham said. Each of the guys has a dedicated female partner, and must learn how to use their bodies as balancing posts and be able to center the weight of their partner directly above their heads on the first try.

“The goal is to center her over their head, and if the girl has to try to balance, it’s done,” Graham said. “Some of the guys catch on fast, but others try to use sheer muscle. That’s not always the way it works.”

Some of the squad members are brand-new to the sport. Sophomore Myles Taylor played tenor saxophone in the marching band before joining the Spirit Squad. He said a friend who cheered on the squad told him about it, and that after visiting a practice he decided he wanted to join.

But Taylor, who joined mid-season last year, said he had a lot of catch up work to do. So he took private lessons and got himself into shape. Tumbling, he said, was the most difficult to learn.

“I did gymnastics when I was young, but that was a long time ago,” Taylor said. “I had to relearn it all.”

The work is no less difficult for the girls, or “flyers.” Though all of them cheered in high school, the state doesn’t allow flying at that level.

But freshman Ashley Weatherd, who also was a competitive diver before she came to Pitt State, flying was easier to learn even though she now has to twist and flip while going up instead of down.

“It’s pretty much the same,” Weatherd said. “I just kind of went with it. If it goes wrong you have to pull it off anyway.”

The team members often are seen with smiles emblazoned across their faces. But don’t let their happy-go-lucky persona fool you, Taylor said. The competitive spirit among cheerleaders, he continued, burns just as strong as on any other type of team, and the group is tightly knit.

“There’s a lot of chemistry and everybody hangs out with each other outside of practice,” Taylor said, adding that the friendly bonding encourages competition. “When you’re around each other for a long time you push each other.
“We’re way past where we were last year, and everybody seem to have the drive to get better.”

Faught said once the men get over the stigma that often accompanies being male cheerleaders, they hit the ground running.

“They’re hooked,” he said. “They’re really competitors.”

The Spirit Squad isn’t just in it for themselves, though. They also participate in activities throughout Pittsburg, and travel to every football game.

“They just love to give back,” Graham said.