With the Sequoits heading down to state this weekend, they are preparing their traditions and superstitions for their last performance of the 2019-2020 season. One of their biggest superstitions started long before the dancers were born.

In 1945 at the National Cheerleading Association camp, the team who had the most pep and spirit got a decorated stick. From there on out, every team has wanted to earn this stick because it is said to represent the teams’ hype and dreams. Over the years, they have evolved into other sports, including dance. Eventually, the legend of the spirit stick reached the Antioch Sequoit dance team. 

Some superstitions have been passed down for decades at Antioch. Through many dancers and coaches, the dance team has always kept their superstitions, including their spirit stick. 

“You can’t drop the spirit stick,” sophomore Haleigh Zenoni said. “Every year a senior passes down to an underclassman and their job is to break it and when they break it, you get a new one. We are super rough with it and the goal is to break it senior year.”

Although it seems foolish, the team strongly believes in this tradition. At the same time, they see it as a lot of pressure being put on them.

“If I don’t break the spirit stick by the end of the year I failed,” junior Kelsi Sheren said. “If I don’t break it, the future teams of Antioch dance team will be cursed.”

After Sheren breaks it, she will buy a completely different one for the next year. This year’s stick is a white stick with a pink circle and a light pink star in the middle. Last year’s senior Claire Reband passed it down to Sheren. 

“It’s like a superstition,” junior Haley Aitken said. “We just like to have it with us at competitions. If we don’t have it, we will think we don’t have good luck. It makes our team more positive and confident.”

Other little things the team does before they compete is kissing their team on the schedule before they go out and they do their team chant before they compete. All these little things are going to help the team get back to the podium this weekend at state.