Meant To Be

"I think it's pretty exciting all the obstacles we had to overcome," said Colleyville Covenant cheer sponsor Stacy McCrary when looking back at her squad's title from the Christian Cheerleaders of America nationals in March. The girls' rise to the top was anything but formulaic. A squad from Covenant Christian Academy, a small school tucked away in residential Colleyville, had never even competed at the national level. McCrary didn't expect it to happen in 2008 either. "The girls were like, 'Let's go do nationals,'" McCrary recalled. "I thought, 'That's a nice dream. Sure we will someday.'" The girls got a boost, though, when a man approached them after a regional competition and asked if they were going to nationals. He went on to explain that he was a judge and felt they were good enough to win it. As one might suspect, that got the girls "fired up" as McCrary put it. Now determined to get to the national competition, the squad still faced plenty of roadblocks. For starters, there was the cost. In roughly one month, the girls would need to raise enough money to cover airfare and accommodations. The cheerleaders and the booster club held fundraisers, and private donations began to pour in. The father of one of the cheerleaders donated new uniforms. The dream was starting to seem possible. "It's something I knew I was going to do," senior cheerleader Andrea Griggs said. "I just knew it was meant to be. During the summer I was like, 'Coach, we're going to nationals.' She was like, 'Okay, whatever Andrea.'" The dream was falling into place, and reality was setting in. "Honestly, I couldn't believe we were going," cheerleader Julie Baugus said. "It was so cool. I didn't think we would ever go to nationals, really." With everything set, it was time to depart for Charlotte, North Carolina. Then, adversity again reared its ugly head. Because of other commitments, not all the girls were on the same flight. Eight girls arrived in North Carolina, expecting the remaining three the following day. Mother Nature had other ideas. A rare March snowstorm sent the other girls' travel plans into chaos. The day of the competition had arrived and only nine of the eleven cheerleaders had made it to Charlotte. "I was panicking," McCrary admitted. "I don't have any experience in this. It was a big drama moment for everybody." Instead of doing their Friday performance, the squad opted to push it to Saturday in hopes that the rest of the girls could make it. It meant the team would have to do its performance almost flawlessly twice in a short amount of time. Finally, all eleven cheerleaders were able to assemble, and the squad embarked on what they referred to as their "all or nothing" shot at a national title. Things appeared doomed again when, in practice, not a single stunt hit. But, performance time came and everything seemed to simply realign. "They walked out there and everything stuck," McCrary said. "That adrenaline just shot through them and everything stuck." The judges must have taken notice, because the squad was named champion of the Medium Varsity division. "I couldn't believe it," Baugus said. "We stood up and started screaming, there were a couple of girls crying. We were so excited. We just came here for the experience. It was our first time to come to nationals and we win first place." "I honestly never thought we'd go," McCrary added. "All the seniors, they always had the faith. I'm ecstatic for them. They worked really hard. I never in my dreams thought we would do that." "The potential has always been there," Griggs said. "We just took the ball and ran with it."