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Suburban dance squads planning 'hard-hitting,' intricate routines at state championships

Two minutes.

That's all these 17 dancers will get to show what they can do, to pull in the audience and leave an impression.

They know the steps. Now, it's about emotion, energy, feeding off the music and each other.

"You just have to go out there and enjoy it," Kristin Burton will tell her Prospect High School squad before its contemporary jazz routine on Friday, the first day of the state dance finals this weekend in Bloomington.

They are not the favorites. They are not Lake Park or Stevenson, teams with a legacy of titles.

"They are so sharp, and they have such technical dancers," Burton said.

But Burton's girls don't have the burden of high expectations. The first dance squad at the Mount Prospect school came together only in April 2014.

"We're calling it the inaugural year," she said. "It's really special that we made it this far."

Judges will pick the top 10 teams in each division - almost 40 high schools from the suburbs will be represented - at the U.S. Cellular Coliseum in Bloomington on Friday. The finalists will compete Saturday. A live broadcast will be streamed at IHSA.tv.

Dancers of all styles - hip-hop, poms, lyrical - will be critiqued off a standard score card, an unusual format adopted by the Illinois High School Association when it sanctioned competitive dance as a sport and hosted its first championship series two years ago. TeamDance Illinois, by contrast, will award trophies in specific events in the nonprofit's state finals in DeKalb Feb. 14.

"This is much more difficult in the fact that everything is lumped into one category," Burton said. "It's more special when you win because you're winning against all these genres."

Libertyville coach Jackie Newman agreed.

"The IHSA format definitely provides an increased and intensified competitive edge to the dance world," Newman said. "There are great teams every year that do not make it out of sectionals."

What makes a winning team? Technical skills and showmanship, of course, but also synchronization.

"When we are out on that floor, every single person matters and every single person needs to be pulling their weight, otherwise the routine falls apart," said Hanna Byington, coach of the St. Charles East High School team.

Squads start choreographing performances months in advance. Fenton Dance Force, a 24-member team, reworked three-quarters of its routine, originally designed at the beginning of the season, after it missed placing second at an early competition because of a misunderstanding of the rules.

"This year has been extremely unpredictable for us. It has been more work than ever before," coach Katherine Payton said. "The amount of work the girls have put in is just incredible."

Fenton practiced many Saturdays to relearn and perfect a new, almost 3-minute hip-hop dance.

"It's a very hard-hitting, very fast-paced routine," Payton said. "It has a really high level of difficulty, a lot of intricate movements and a lot of energy."

Libertyville's routine, on the other hand, is emotional.

"The focus of our lyrical routine this year is a broken heart. Our song is 'Impossible' by James Arthur." Newman said. "The way James Arthur sings and the lyrics of the song really present an emotional piece. The dancers at Libertyville have always really shined when being asked to portray this kind of feeling."

In Class 3A, last year's champion, Lake Park High School in Roselle, is poised to defend its title, a confident coach Danielle Ragano said.

"The girls are completely ready for it," Ragano said. "We're hoping we'll have some good results this weekend."

The Neuqua Valley High School dance team will perform a routine members choreographed themselves to a version of the song "Have A Little Faith In Me" by Tess Boyer, coach Sonja Rzeszutko said.

"We picked apart the song. Everyone had an eight-count and gave their own input," Rzeszutko said. "You could just tell that the girls really bought into the choreography, and they perform it really well."

Rzeszutko said she hopes for consistency in judging for her squad of 16 dancers, who she said have responded well to advice about improving their performance.

"The girls are just really driven," she said. "They've done a really good job of taking corrections as corrections and not as criticism."

It's a work ethic expected of this year's crop of state contenders. At Prospect, when students aren't spending up to eight hours a week under Burton's direction, they're taking dance classes outside of school.

"I just have really, really hardworking dancers," she said. "They make me want to work harder."

• Daily Herald staff writers Marie Wilson, Madhu Krishnamurthy and Mick Zawislak contributed to this report

Fenton Dance Force members wearing their “Hunger Games” uniforms work their routine during a competition in Mundelein. Courtesy of Fenton Dance Force
Fenton Dance Force members perform in their “Hunger Games” uniforms at a competition in Mundelein. The team from Fenton High School in Bensenville will be competing this weekend at state. Courtesy of Fenton Dance Force
Members of the Fenton Dance Force from Fenton High School in Bensenville celebrate after winning a sectional competition. The team is competing in Class 2A in this weekend's IHSA state finals. Courtesy of Fenton Dance Force
The dance team from Neuqua Valley High School in Naperville will be competing this weekend in the Class 3A IHSA state championships. Courtesy of Sonja Rzeszutko
The Prospect High School 2014-15 competitive dance team. Courtesy of Prospect High School
Coach Kristin Piekarski, at right, and the Stevenson Patriettes are heading for Bloomington.
Courtesy of Jackie NewmanThe Libertyville High School dance team celebrates its sectional title.The squad will compete at state on Friday in Bloomington.

Suburban squads at state

Local high schools in the Illinois High School Association Competitive Dance state championships Friday in Bloomington

Division 1A Aurora Central Catholic

IC Catholic (Elmhurst)

Division 2A Buffalo Grove

Cary-Grove

Crystal Lake Central

Crystal Lake South

Fenton (Bensenville)

Geneva

Lakes Community (Lake Villa

Libertyville

Rolling Meadows

St. Francis (Wheaton)

Vernon Hills

Wauconda

Division 3A Adlai Stevenson (Lincolnshire)

Barrington

Bartlett

Downers Grove South

William Fremd (Palatine)

Glenbard North (Carol Stream)

Jacobs (Algonquin)

Lake Park (Roselle)

Lake Zurich

Maine South (Park Ridge)

Mundelein

Naperville North

Neuqua Valley (Naperville)

Prospect (Mount Prospect)

St. Charles East

St. Charles North

South Elgin

Waubonsie Valley (Aurora)

York (Elmhurst)

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