Photo Courtesy of Mid-Prairie Dance Team Social Media

Golden Hawks flew south this winter, as the Mid-Prairie dance team competed at the Dance Team Union national competition in February, marking the first time that the dance team competed at a national level.

The Golden Hawks performed two of their routines, competing in the Small Varsity Pom and Small Varsity Hip-Hop categories. For the former, Mid-Prairie scored an 80.80 in preliminaries, advancing to semi-finals, where they finished 15th with an 81.26. In the latter, the team scored a 79.18 before finishing 14th in the semi-finals with an 82.52.

Mid-Prairie dance coach Brenna Hutson says that plenty of the teams competing in Orlando were teams that make it every year. She further says the experience of competing at nationals for the first time will improve the team moving forward, “Just having that experience and bringing that home is something unexplainable. We saw a bunch of different styles. We saw teams go out and support each other and support other teams, which was super exciting. We actually had a team from Oklahoma sit and watch our routine and cheer us on in the stands, which was super cool. Just being able to make those friendships with people who just admire and adore dance as much as the rest of our girls do.”

Four seniors were a part of this year’s team including Meadow Flynn, Paige Malichki, Ariel Kauffman, and Drea McCain. This year, the seniors choreographed the team’s jazz routine, which they performed several times throughout the year. The dance team wrapped up its season on February 28th with Dance Team Night at the Mid-Prairie High School Gymnasium.