The Elite Performance Academy senior cheer squad placed third at the United Cheer Association championships, a national level event, in Tacoma, Wash., on Saturday.
Throughout Elite’s season, its youth team earned six first-place trophies and finished second at the Spirit of the West championships held in Salem on Feb. 23.
The senior team earned three second-place trophies and three first-place trophies throughout the season, and finished the season with the third-place trophy at Tacoma in the small senior level two division.
“They did extremely well,” said Coach Tiffany Lynn. “They proved themselves above and beyond what I could have ever expected them to. I can’t say how proud I am.”
“They started off very strong,” Lynn said. “We got to our pyramid sequence and, unfortunately, had an error.”
That was the only thing that went wrong in the performance, she said. “They came through and kept their heads up and ended up third.”
The team has had a lot of changes throughout the season, Lynn said, but it stayed focusd.
“That says a lot about the team members and their families,” Lynn said. “I have a phenomenal parent club. Without them this wouldn’t have happened.”
Meranda Sayers is the EPA parent club president, and she went above and beyond, Lynn said.
Competing team members included Kiana Colwell, Cierra Baltezore, Hailey Mitten, Nikki Tipwood, Kylie Malloy, Jamie Zavala, Erin Bauer, Haylee Hardin, Britney Zook, Mariah Armstrong, Regan LaCoste, Sarah Kinyon, Cassie Lien and Shelby Goodwin.