Cheer placed sixth overall at the 16th annual North Cheer Invitational.

“I think the competition went well overall, and I always enjoy running a competition. It’s fun to be the worker at the competition, but it can be stressful especially since we have to compete as well. But it ran well in general,” said senior Brea Fahey.

With working an event and competing, the team feels the effects by the end of the day.

“It’s a really cool event for all of us! We all love being there, and the energy is always really good! Working all day and then competing is somewhat challenging, but having a bunch of fans and support there makes it better,” said senior Olivia Rouse.

Having that time at home can bring the team advantages while also bringing downsides.

“I would say the advantages to hosting are that we are comfortable with the setup of the competition, and it is always nice to compete somewhere that is familiar. We also tend to have a lot of fans come out to watch since it is so close to home! The only disadvantage is that it is a long, very busy day,” said head varsity coach Ashley Barrie.

The team is working with their comments from their previous competitions to get ready for their next one at Grayslake Central on January 20, and sectionals in a few weeks.

“We are going to be working on the things the judges said. We need to improve on are the takeaways from the past comp that we need to improve for the next competition. We want to keep improving our score since the competition this year is hard. Everyone’s really amazing, and we just want to be the best we can be. And with the small fixes we are doing, the routine I think it’ll help our score and placement,” Fahey said.

The team is reflecting on the season overall leading up to two of their biggest competitions.

“We worked so hard this season, and it’s been going super well. In the last comp we were down a few people so we had to make changes. We will definitely work so much harder next competition and take judges’ feedback so our score goes up even more,” said senior Angela Caliendo.

For more information and updates on the team, one can follow their Instagram page @gnhs.varsitycheer