In the west commons, students and staff gathered around a 50 inch flat screen. The words, Canyon Randall, flashed on screen and cheerleaders dressed in black and silver quickly slipped into formation.

The televised event was UIL’s State Spirit Championship Competition, where the Randall cheerleading squad would go on to finish 12th in state.

“The competition is a fairly new sport for Texas schools,” RHS Cheerleading sponsor Tarran West said. “To make finals our first year competing and to come in 12th was a big accomplishment.”

There were three parts to the competition: band chant, crowd leading and fight song where judges scored each team on things such as technique, sharpness, stunts and how much spirit the squad displayed.

“[Right before we went on stage] there was a lot of anxiety backstage,” sophomore Alyssa Miera said. “There was a lot of stress because we wanted to perform at our best. We were talking, trying to calm ourselves down and we tried to stay positive and not think of anything negative.”

The Randall squad competed in the 5AD2 division, which began with roughly 70 teams.

“We performed great in prelims,” Miera said. “From the 70 schools that competed, only the top 20 moved on to finals and we finished in 7th place.”

However, the Randall team suffered a few hiccups in the final round when one stunt fell and another didn’t go all the way up. Despite this, West said she was proud of the team for their performance.

“I know the team didn’t get the results they wanted but I could not be happier for them the way they represented RHS,” West said. “This is a very talented team that worked together.”