Scoring High

When you hear the term scoring you think of scoring a basket or getting the ball in the net, but in cheer we score points of difficulty and by clean transitions. Hitting the higher score, just like in every other sport makes you the winner.

There is a different scoring sheet for every level in cheer. The levels range from level one to level six with sub-categories. The levels look like: tiny’s level one for four and five year olds, mini level two for nine and younger, youth level three for twelve and younger, junior level four for fourteen and younger, and senior level for five and six for eighteen and older. The subcategories look like: Small Senior All Girl, Medium Senior All Girl, Large Senior All Girl, Small Senior Coed,  Medium Senior Coed, Large Senior Coed, International All Girl 5, International Coed 5, International All Girl 6, and International Coed 6. Now thats a lot of different cheerleading groups I bet you had no idea about!

At competition you want the highest score and to get that high score you must avoid getting deducted. Deductions can be anywhere from building bobbles, which deduct .50, to athlete bobbles, which deduct .25, and also there are deductions if you fail to follow the safety rules, time limit, or stay within the competition boundary. This is just like every other sport for example, basketball if you go outside the lines you get called on and other team gets the ball. Same thing in cheer if you go outside the lines you are deducted points.

All-star judges determine scores by stunts, pyramids, tosses, standing tumbling, running tumbling, jumps, dance, and technique range on a scale of low, medium, or high. Being judged low means things hardly hit or a very low amount of the athletes participated in one section or another.  Being judges medium means you hit the majority of the stunts, majority of the athletes participated in each sections, but had messy transitions from one place on the mat to another.

Bet you didn’t think there was this many ways to score point or have this many things to be deducted on. This is why cheerleader aim to be perfect with no mess ups. We get one chance to compete unlike other sports teams who get compete other teams numerous times throughout the year. We aim to get that perfect score the first time!