MFHS cheer team showcases Mustang spirit at UIL competition
Lauren Berkman/Special to The Highlander
Marble Falls High School cheerleaders stayed focused and pumped up behind the scenes Jan. 18 during the UIL Spirit Competition in Fort Worth.
By Lew K. Cohn
Managing Editor
The Marble Falls High School Mustang cheerleaders reached new heights Friday, Jan. 18, with a sixth-place finish in Class 5A Division II at the UIL Spirit Competition in Fort Worth — the program's best finish ever.
This was the first year Spirit was an official sanctioned University Interscholastic League contest after previously serving as a pilot program. The competition, held at Fort Worth Convention Center, includes three contest categories: crowd leading, fight song and band dance.
Marble Falls scored an 86.45 in the finals to finish in the Top 10 for the second straight year, having finished eighth overall in 2018. The Mustangs missed the Top 5 by less than four points.
San Antonio Alamo Heights (95.7) placed first in 2019 after being runnersup in 2018, followed by last year's champion Mission Sharyland Pioneer (93.65) and Castroville Medina Valley (91.4). Montgomery (90.15) was fourth and Royse City (90) was fifth.
In the finals, Marble Falls finished sixth in crowd leading with a two-judge average score of 43.55, just behind fifth place Montgomery (43.95). Alamo Heights was first in crowd leading, with Medina Valley second and Sharyland Pioneer third. Royse City was fourth.
In fight song and band dance, the Mustangs finished 13th with a 42.9, but were just a point away from sixth place Forney (43.9). The close grouping of schools allowed Marble Falls to remain in sixth place when the scores were combined.
The Mustangs were in sixth place overall after the preliminaries early Friday morning, scoring 200 points. Alamo Heights, Sharyland Pioneer, Medina Valley, Hallsville and Jacksonville were the Top 5 after preliminaries. The top 20 teams in each classification advance from preliminaries to finals.
MFHS was seventh in the band chant prelims with a 49.367, 12th in fight song with a 68.733 and 22nd in crowd leading with a 81.9. Combined, this gave Marble Falls enough points to be in third place at the break as the teams which finished in the Top 3 didn't perform until later that afternoon.
