Brenau University’s competitive cheerleading team claimed its first-ever national title earlier this month.
The Golden Tigers captured the National Cheerleading Association title in the Advanced All Girl NAIA division in Daytona Beach, Fla. last weekend.
“This team has been so determined from day one to be the absolute best that they could be and to make history for Brenau’s cheerleading program,” Head Coach Bralee Housworth said. “I’m beyond proud of them, and I can’t wait to continue to celebrate this huge accomplishment.”
The Golden Tigers opened the competition with a score of 88.7 in the prelims and built a comfortable 14-point lead over second-place Rocky Mountain (Mont.).
Housworth, in her second year coaching the team, was effusive in her praise of the squad’s performance.
“I couldn’t have asked for a better prelim performance from the team. They hit everything and had zero deductions,” she said.
The Golden Tigers rode their strong preliminary round performance into the finals. The squad delivered a final round score of 84.25 and an overall event score of 85.3 to be crowned national champs.
“The team’s finals performance was fantastic, but we had deductions from a mistake in the pyramid,” Housworth said. “However, I believed that the rest of the performance was strong enough to lead us to a National Championship.”
Avila (Mo.) University finished second with an event score of 74.0125, while Rocky Mountain (73.0125) and Ottawa (Ariz.) University (71.3917) rounded out the top-four finishers.
The squad returns 13 letter winners to next year’s program.
