Lakeland Dance Team Soaring Into 2020 Season

Undefeated throughout their season last year and national champions two years in a row, the Lakeland Dance Team has come far since first starting out in 1999. Originally, the dance team was labeled as a club; however, their high ranking performances allowed them to become a sport as of last year, fulfilling a dream almost twenty years later.

The 2019 to 2020 dance team has eleven members, half of them freshmen and new to the team. Senior Annie Wogisch, the team captain for this year’s team believes that with graduation last year, “We lost a lot of important dancers, but we also gained a lot of new members and I think we have the potential to have a great year.” Wogisch and the team have high hopes when it comes to keeping their title of national champions. 

The Lakeland Dance Team practices three times a week for about two hours. Many members are also studio dancers, so after their two hour rehearsal, they head over to take classes for another four hours. 

The two dance styles the team competes are known as pom and jazz. The team competes in those two categories in a total of five regional competitions, state competition, and then Dance Team Union’s Nationals in Florida. For the past two years, the team has taken three days out of February to compete in a national competition. Both years the team returned home with one gigantic trophy and the title of Small Group Jazz National Champions. 

Dance team is an amazing sport to be a part of. Not only can high schoolers participate in this winter sport through their high school experience, but can continue to be a part of a dance team in college. Seniors who have graduated in the past received scholarship money for college.

Update: LRHS Dance Team placed second in jazz and fourth in pom at the Bergenfield High School Dance Invitational  on January 26, 2020.