This was posted to Twitter repeatedly today by a disgruntled fan:
Twitter / IndustryNewsIN: Interesting... #NCANationals ...
Caused a whole uproar on Twitter between fangirls and Cheetah fans...
You cannot imagine my frustration/dismay to get back to messageboard/emails/etc. full of discussion about that. I happen to coach that team, so I was right in the middle of all of that. Suffice it to say that our version of events and what was said is VERY different from the one that has been portrayed. In fairness, I'm probably not able to look at it objectively. The logic side of me says to simply ignore all of it, but I simply can't let my kids get slammed like that without responding.
My version:
The scene after Cheetahs went day 1 was ridiculous. The coaches were trying to to corral the team to do the normal post-routine talk, but it was nearly impossible. Like in Houston, there were people walking INTO the huddle while we were obviously trying to talk to them. We moved down the hall to a more secluded area - trying to get a least a tiny bit of privacy for what ANY cheer person would know was going to be an unpleasant discussion. We managed (with some help from some of the more sane parents there with their kids) to keep the crowd back about 10-15 feet or so while we talked to them for a few minutes.
NCA has a curtained-off area to watch the replay of your performance. When the NCA staff called us over after our short 1st talk, the crowd (with MANY parents) was blocking the way to the replay room. We were worried we were going to miss our replay. I admit to being pretty frustrated with the whole scene at this point and was probably more rude than I needed to be to get the team there.
We still hadn't had time to really get into everything we wanted to cover so, we found a room we could basically lock to finish our discussion. This went on for about 10 minutes or so. The team decided to stay together as a team and find a place in the stands to watch the rest of the CA teams perform. We told them it was OK to politely decline autograph/photo requests on their way there if they chose to stay together. The team then walked out of the room while the coaches stayed back to talk about our plan for the next day.
My assumption is that this is when this girl allegedly was refused her autograph. I wasn't there to hear every word of what our athletes said, but I can't imagine any of them saying "no" the way she portrayed it. I guess it is possible, but I would be really surprised.
I don't want to blow this out of proportion, or milk it for any sympathy. If we do our job and the routine goes as planned, the whole scene has a completely different "vibe." Also, unlike Majors/ACA, it never felt dangerous. I'm sure we didn't handle every detail of either day's "post game talk" perfectly and I can understand why some would be frustrated with how the team acted. Any situation where a young girl gets turned away for an autograph can certainly be viewed with anger by that girl's parent. I get that.
For what it is worth, after an unfortunately similar situation in finals, I sat and watched absolutely devastated kids do their best to put on a happy face and sign bows for what seemed like at least an hour after we had finished talking to them. From what I could see, they waited until every single person who wanted a pic/signature got one. If that girl wants to send us her bow, I will make sure the whole team signs it.
