Guy cheerleaders help boost team's season

As Glenbard South High School cheerleading coach Erica Andrews looks back on the accomplishments of her squad over the last several years in Glen Ellyn, she has definitely had something to cheer about.

She is proud of her team's achievements and hopes that this winning tradition will continue. This year Andrews will lose her four male cheerleaders, who are all graduating seniors.

"We've had a lot of success, partly because we're coed," Andrews said. "I'd like to keep the coed thing going."

Andrews remembers the pivotal moment when she made the effort to add guys to the team.

"It was my first year as head coach, " she said.

The Illinois High School Association had declared cheerleading an official sport starting in 2006, and Andrews decided it wouldn't be a bad idea to add to her team.

"I decided to have another tryout."

Andrews encouraged her cheerleaders to talk up the idea to some of their guy friends to try out for the squad. At that next meeting, in October 2006, Andrews got a big surprise.

"Sitting there were seven guys," she said. "They seemed like they were eager."

But she was realistic. Practices were difficult and time-consuming.

"I was a little doubtful they would last."

Andrews had hired an assistant coach, Jason Trost.

"He talked to the guys at the meeting. We started to show them the basic stunting."

Stunting often involves building pyramids and tossing a teammate in the air, activities that benefit from the male team members with their added strength. Andrews figures the stunting is the thing that got the boys interested.

"Stunting is a challenge. It's probably the most fun part of cheerleading. It's the initial hook for the boys," she said.

If Andrews had any doubts that the boys would work out, they were erased at the first Glenbard South pep rally after becoming coed, when they did their routine.

"I didn't want them to get booed. When they went out, I got the sense that people in the crowd were getting a bit rowdy," she said. "They launched a girl 30 feet in the air. Everyone was cheering. It was awesome."

Of those original seven young men, a few eventually dropped out. But to their credit, Andrews said, "All of them did complete the year."

That was the beginning of several winning seasons with each year getting better.

"We've had three consecutive trips to state championships," Andrews added.

At the most recent state competition, Feb. 1-2 in Bloomington, they took 11th place, up from 13th last year.

On the varsity cheerleading squad, there are 23 cheerleaders with 12 of them graduating this year, including the only four guys: Kyle Berg, David Lyons, Kevin Murphy and Tony Shustar.

Murphy modestly attributes their overall success to the hard work of the entire squad.

"It's our job to support the team. It's hard work most of the time," he added.

From his point of view, there are benefits to being one of the few male cheerleaders on a squad, besides the obvious one of getting to meet girls.

For Shustar, cheerleading has prepared him for the future.

"The workplace is coed. It gets you used to working with the opposite sex," he said. "I've made a lot of good friends."

Berg is glad that the girls encouraged him to try out for the squad -- "There's lots of teamwork. I loved the entire experience." He plans on cheerleading at Purdue next fall.

As for coach Andrews, she has not yet set a date for tryouts for next year's squad, but she hopes that some young men will accept the challenge and try out.

"I am hoping that next year we will get some new guys on the team, and that this story will have a happy ending."