Twelve seniors on the Hollister High school cheerleading team,
along with departing seventh-year coach Linda Yetter, will take the
floor for the final time this weekend at the state’s largest
competition
– the UCA West Coast Championships.
Twelve seniors on the Hollister High school cheerleading team, along with departing seventh-year coach Linda Yetter, will take the floor for the final time this weekend at the state’s largest competition – the UCA West Coast Championships.
The girls left this afternoon on a seven hour bus ride to Disneyland, one last chance to perform a routine they have tirelessly practiced, one last opportunity to be under the spotlight together.
“We’ve been working on the routine for like four or five months,” said senior captain Jamee Hatzembuhler. “I’ve cheered for four years, and this is the best team we’ve ever had.”
The team, Hatzembuhler said, has become remarkably close throughout the season – which Yetter said is technically over with the boys basketball team’s exit from the Central Coast Section Division I playoffs last Saturday.
Hours of practice – and fundraising – have built up to the event Saturday at which the freshmen, junior varsity and varsity teams will all vie for 1st through 5th placements throughout the day.
“The competition will be tough and we’re preparing the best we can,” Yetter said.
Hatzembuhler added, “I’m going in with really high expectations to place.”
Forty girls are out for cheerleading this year, including eight freshmen, 14 JV and 17 varsity. One member of the freshmen team, Amanda Johnson, can no longer compete because she recently contracted mononucleosis.
The JV cheerleaders are coached by Kelli Yetter, Linda’s daughter. And the freshman team is coached by Georgia Padilla.
Linda and Kelli Yetter both said the teams sacrificed countless hours of extra practice time, and even some Saturdays, to prepare for the West Coast Championships.
Hatzembuhler said, “It’s a lot harder work than most people think.”
This week in practice, they fine-tuned an array of tumbling and gymnastics. One of those was an exercise called a pyramid. During a part of the exercise called a flatback, cheerleaders are continually swung swiftly in a circular motion – with their backs parallel and close to the ground – by teammates holding their arms and legs. They transition in a matter of moments into a pyramid shape, some standing high in the air on the palms of teammates.
Yetter said each year when the team competes at the West Coast or National Championship, the crowd cheers in amazement at the whipping motions of the flatback.
“A big part of the score sheet is timing,” she said.
Baler cheerleading teams in recent years – including 2001 and 2002 – have competed at the UCA National High School Cheerleading Championship at Disneyworld in Orlando, Fla. But this year they chose the West Coast Championship because the Balers strongest suits don’t include gymnastics. She said teams “can’t be competitive at the national level” without it.
And after seven years, Yetter decided to make this season her last because she “just needed a break personally.”
“I’ve taught them everything I know how to teach,” she said and added that the incoming coach from Monterey specializes in gymnastics and will take a talented group of girls to another level.
Yetter wouldn’t make any predictions for Saturday and only asked one thing from the girls she said “have come a long way”
“My expectations are that every girl will do their very best,” she said.
