High School Confusion With Standard Competitive Cheer

[Elsye]

Alright, so I'm a Michigan competitive cheerleader, have been for four years. A few years ago I realized that we have unique ways of cheerleading (if you don't know what I'm talking about, there's a thread that explains it.) so I'm reading through these threads and I keep getting confused about what some people talk about. I do enjoy watching high school competitive cheer on YouTube, but I don't know all the rules and how they're different than Michigans. What tumbling do you have to have to make the team? For us it's a back walkover, for some cheer teams in Michigan it's a handspring, others its a tuck. And I kept seeing abbreviations for some associations, and I was wondering if that was for everyone. We have the MHSAA, which is for all Michigan high school sports. And how many competitions do you guys have? We have one or two per week, between December and late February, then there's districts, regionals and states. Please help me understand! Thank you :)


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[MHSCheercoach]

I can only speak for Illinois but we have a similar organization called IHSA, Illinois High School Association, that hosts competitive cheer and we also have ICCA, Illinois Cheer Coaches Association. IHSA has the overall say basically. We are only allowed to do 5 competitions not counting IHSA state finals. Our competitions cannot start until November and our competitive season ends after IHSA state finals which is the first week of February. IHSA and ICCA use the exact same score sheet, rubric, and format for competitions. For IHSA, they split teams up into different sectional competitions. All sectional competitions happen on the same day therefore you get one shot at being one of the top 3-5 teams in order to go to State Finals. ICCA has regional competitions each weekend (sometimes 2 in a weekend) starting at the end of November-December. ICCA you have to score 78% of the possible score to qualify, meaning there could be 10 teams that qualify from your division or none. It's more of a situation where you're competing against yourself at regionals. Then any teams that qualify can go on to state which is the first weekend in January.
Neither IHSA or ICCA dictate what skills you need in order to make a team, that decision is left up to each school or coach. I can't speak for every school in Illinois, but I know that the majority of the schools in Central Illinois do not require a specific skill in order to make the team.
I believe every high school team is supposed to follow the rules set forth by their State Association and NFHS, the National Federation of High School Sports.
I know it can be confusing since each state has a different organization, requirements for routines, etc. but I think that's what is awesome about cheerleading, it's an ever changing sport.

 

[stuntjumptumble]

New Jersey is very varied when it comes to high school competition cheer. Some teams are like level 1, others like level 5. Some compete UCA or NCA, some at all star comps, others at local high schools comps. My team for example, we have girls with just round offs and others with layouts and fulls. In jersey it's not as serious as say, Georgia.


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[Elsye]

Thank you! This makes a little more sense!


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[Elsye]

New Jersey is very varied when it comes to high school competition cheer. Some teams are like level 1, others like level 5. Some compete UCA or NCA, some at all star comps, others at local high schools comps. My team for example, we have girls with just round offs and others with layouts and fulls. In jersey it's not as serious as say, Georgia.


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Yeah I've seen Georgia competitions before, and they are crazy good! So they're one of the more serious states? What other states are more serious about cheer? Just curious


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[MHSCheercoach]

Kentucky and Tennessee are very serious when it comes to cheer along with Texas and Oklahoma too. I feel that Illinois takes it very serious, but IHSA does not allow us to compete in any competitions after their state finals which makes it impossible for Illinois to be represented at Nationals now.

If you ever just want to check out Illinois high school competition you can go to www.ihsa.org, click on the IHSA tv link and choose competitive cheer. Lot's of teams to watch!
Do other states have a similar place where you can watch videos from competition, besides youtube?

 

[Elsye]

[quote="MHSCheercoach, post: 802981, member: 18223"

If you ever just want to check out Illinois high school competition you can go to www.ihsa.org, click on the IHSA tv link and choose competitive cheer. Lot's of teams to watch!
Do other states have a similar place where you can watch videos from competition, besides youtube?[/quote]
Ok I will, thanks! And idk at the MHSAA website there might be videos, but I've never tried looking. I stick to mostly YouTube.


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[Elsye]

[quote="MHSCheercoach, post: 802981, member: 18223"

If you ever just want to check out Illinois high school competition you can go to www.ihsa.org, click on the IHSA tv link and choose competitive cheer. Lot's of teams to watch!
Do other states have a similar place where you can watch videos from competition, besides youtube?

Ok I will, thanks! And idk at the MHSAA website there might be videos, but I've never tried looking. I stick to mostly YouTube.


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Ok something just went wrong on that.....idk what


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[Daniellerae]

Ahh yay, I love finding other Michigan cheerleaders! :)


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[Elsye]

Ahh yay, I love finding other Michigan cheerleaders! :)


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Yay Michigan cheerleaders!! :)


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