February 7, 2002 — There was so much enthusiasm in the gym, I was surprised there was room for anything else. The Johnson High cheerleaders may be small, but their sound is decidedly big.
From the moment the Knights opened their collective mouth, they owned the room. They controlled everything inside of it. Including me.
Mighty blue and white! Get up off your feet!
OK. Sure. Whatever you say. I was blown away.
“That’s a lot of spirit,” I whispered to Johnson coach Karen Ellis.
“That’s what we’re shooting for,” Ellis whispered back.
This was last Wednesday in Johnson’s stuffy auxiliary gym, three days before the Knights were scheduled to compete for a state championship down in Columbus.
Johnson has long been considered one of Georgia’s top competitive cheerleading schools, but has yet to win the state’s top prize. The Knights have finished second in their classification seven times in the past nine years.
There was no second-place finish for Johnson on Saturday. Unfortunately, no first-place finish, either. The Knights placed third in Class AAA, 11 points behind state champion South Forsyth, the team that placed second to the Knights in the Region 7-AAA tournament the week before.
But last Wednesday, the Johnson cheerleaders filled their practice gym with high hopes. Their post-practice task of teaching a newspaper reporter how to do a side-hurdler jump likely seemed just as daunting as chasing after an elusive state title.
The Knights tumbled and jumped and cheered their way through practice while Johnson wrestlers trained in the distance. They were simply two sports teams preparing for the playoffs.
Just another sport. At Johnson, that’s how competitive cheerleading was considered long before the Georgia High School Association began recognizing it as such in 1994. The Knights won three state championships in the Georgia Athletic Coaches Association prior to that.
“At our school, our kids know we work hard,” said Ellis, Johnson’s coach since 1977. “Our faculty knows we work hard. The other athletic teams know we work hard. And we have respect here. At some schools, they’re not as competitive as we are. And that’s OK.”
The Knights look like a sports team. They embody none of the “hair spray and hoop earrings” stereotype that tends to follow cheerleading around.
When I walked into the gym, they were doing push-ups.
“I was a cheerleader when cheerleading was just put on your little skirt and go out there,” said Ellis, who went to Waycross High in the 1960s. “Cheerleading has changed tremendously. I’ve just learned along with it.”
Yes, the Knights cheerleaders still lead cheers for Johnson’s football and basketball teams, but their season is really geared toward the competition season that begins in December.
Johnson’s 14-member team was whittled down from an original pool of more than 35 at tryouts in August. That’s when they started piecing together the two-and-a-half-minute routine they would take to the tournaments.
It’s a combination of gymnastics, dance and showmanship, all set to music. And they’ve been through it hundreds of times. Over and over again. It’s got to be perfect.
You see, there are no second downs in competitive cheerleading, no next at-bat to redeem yourself. It’s one shot and done, and hope the judges like you. That’s a lot of pressure, and a lot of practice.
“Yeah, you kind of get tired of the music,” said senior captain Rachel Burke. “But we could sing the whole thing because we know it by heart. We’ve heard it so many times.”
Somehow, Burke and her crew manage to exhibit the enthusiasm of first-timers on each and every run through the routine.
“We really stress that more than other schools do, the energy and the excitement,” Burke said. “I think that’s what makes us so different. You have to put everything into it every time, all of your heart into it every time. Because otherwise it doesn’t have that Johnson look.”
And that “Johnson look” can be seen just as easily from the back row as the front. Expressions are exaggerated. Eyes and mouths open wide. Ponytails go flying, emphasizing every phrase.
Imagine the faces you make when you talk to a baby. On the judges’ scoring sheets, these are called “Good Facials.”
After practice, I asked sophomore Jennifer Cao whether her face gets sore from all the smiling.
“Yeah,” Cao responded with yet another smile. “Sometimes our cheeks kind of tingle.”
That’s right, we’re number one! Hold on to your seats, we’ve only just begun!
On the Knights’ final run-through of their routine, they hit it almost perfectly. And they were out of breath.”Very good y’all,” Ellis said. “That’s the best it’s been.”
Then came the hard part of practice. Teaching me.
“Do I have to do the expressions?” I asked.
“That’s the most important part,” Ellis replied with a chuckle.
So the Johnson cheerleaders taught me some of the basics. And the basics, I believe, were all I could be taught.There were the jumps: the tuck, the side-hurdler and the toe-touch (which was more of a “toe-reach” after I got done with it).
I butchered some of the dance routine before I moved on to the “stunts,” which basically involved me lifting Cao up in the air (granted, she weighs less than 85 pounds).
I’m not sure whether judges would have classified my grimaces as “Good Facials” or not. But after each one of my awkward attempts at being a cheerleader, the real cheerleaders clapped and laughed.
Well, mostly they just laughed.