Game Plan Spirit

It's been a year of firsts for the New Palestine cheerleading squad. The team won the Hoosier Heritage Conference cheer competition, which it had never placed in before, and it was also the first time in school history the team made it to the state championships. It finished second in Class 3A to Bishop Dwenger. How big was it for the rest of the New Pal high school community? Let's just say they had a good following at the state championships - every sport was represented, and numerous fans bought and wore New Palestine cheerleading shirts, as they played the role of cheerleader as well. "New Palestine has never gone to state before," squad coach Deb Weiler says. "Just to be there was an accomplishment. And to take state 3A runner-up? We'll take it." Five of the New Pal cheerleaders - seniors Lauren Hough, Kelsey Pope and Liza Angelicchio and juniors Amanda Hough and Jennifer Long - also finished first in the school's first ever partner stunt group. "We definitely had the most difficult stunt transitions," says Hough, who plans to cheer at Indiana University next fall. "We had to do a lot more to get recognized, and we didn't know what to expect or what it would be like." Weiler said she was very impressed with both the partner stunt group's and the overall team's performance, something that may be attributed to a positive "unknown" element. "Their overall presentation from the moment they walked onto the floor was great, and they were a crowd pleaser," Weiler recalls. "They had nothing to lose, and it looked like they were having fun. They had never 'walked through the tunnel' before and didn't know what to expect, which I think that unknown can be a good thing." Weiler, who teaches fourth grade at Sugar Creek Elementary and has been the head coach for the past two years, cheered and graduated from New Palestine in 1979 and also married her New Pal school sweetheart, Scott. One year after they married, though, Scott was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. Scott is fighting the disease to this day, and Deb has made a conscious effort to help out in the community as much as she possibly could. And it certainly showed this year. The New Pal squad was able to perform as the opening act for the Best Buddies National Leadership Conference. The Best Buddies organization was an endeavor started by Anthony Kennedy Shriver, and it aims to help those with intellectual disabilities. "At the UCA summer camp at IU, we were approached by the Best Buddies chapter president David Quilleon, and they were looking for an opening act for their conference, in which about 2,000 people would be attending," Weiler explains. "After I made sure everything was approved, we practiced all that week and performed." New Pal's performance was well-received, to say the least. "To hear the applause and to see kids excited to see our girls perform was just amazing," Weiler says, remembering the event as if it just happened again. "We were speechless; it was just the coolest thing." Because of that performance, the girls on the squad wanted to start a Best Buddies chapter of their own at New Pal. And they got exactly what they wished for. "We were granted a chapter for this past fall," Weiler says. "We had more than 100 students come to the meeting. Our special ed numbers are growing, and we felt that we needed a Best Buddies chapter." In addition to the Best Buddies conference, the New Pal squad also helped wrap gifts for underprivileged kids around Christmas time and participated in and won the Indianapolis 500 Mini-Marathon for the second consecutive year. The team plans to make it three in a row this May. "Cheerleading can have such a negative label to it," Weiler says. "Yes, these girls cheer on their teams, but it has been the other things they've done that they will take with them for the rest of their lives. I hope I've instilled some values of giving back to the community."