By Jeff Vorva
Correspondent
The Marist competitive cheerleading team has an impressive resume.
The RedHawks have in their history brought home six IHSA large-school trophies. They took second place in 2013, 2018, 2019 and 2022, and earned third-place trophies in 2012 and 2020.
They are still searching for that elusive state championship, and will get another shot at one at the state finals, scheduled to be held Feb. 2-3 at Grossinger Motors Arena in Bloomington.
Marist was the only area team to win a sectional title, on as the RedHawks took first place and dominated the field in the Rolling Meadows Sectional on Jan. 27 with a score of 94.50. The second-place team was Maine South (86.60).
The area will be well-represented at state.
Evergreen Park placed second in the medium-school division at the Hinsdale South Sectional with a score of 90.67.
Sandburg finished second in the large-school division (93.47). The Eagles have qualified for the state finals in each of the event’s 19 years.
Richards took fifth in the large-school division at Hinsdale South with a score of 87.70, just barely qualifying for state as the Bulldogs nudged out Yorkville (87.17) and Joliet West (87.12) for the final qualifying spot.
Also at Hinsdale, Lyons took third (90.17) and Reavis claimed fifth (88.80) in the co-ed division.
Dancing stars
No area teams claimed top-three trophies, but two placed in the top 12 in the state’s competitive dance finals held Jan. 26-27 at Grossinger Motors Arena.
Lyons finished sixth in Class 3A (90.98) and Nazareth claimed ninth in Class 1A (84.68).
Stevenson took the Class 3A state championship (96.34).
Argo took 14th in the Class 2A preliminary (84.62) and Marist took 24th (79.65).
On the lanes
Area boys bowling teams were shut out of second-day competition at the state finals, held Jan. 26-27 at St. Clair Bowl in O’Fallon. When all was said and done, Lyons claimed 18th and Oak Lawn finished 23rd.
However, four individual bowlers made it to the second day.
Morton sophomore Desmond Zuro took 19th with a 2,559 for 12 games. From Lyons, junior Danny Haley took 50th with a 2,389, freshman Anthony Bonilla took 62nd with a 2,292 and senior Cesar Izguerra closed out his high school career with a 2,219 for a 66th-place finish.
On the mat
For the first time in the short history of girls wrestling, the IHSA format allowed for regionals to feed into sectionals.
Area champions in the De La Salle Regional were De La Salle’s Anapaula Cerna (100 pounds), Morton’s Monica Garcia (120), Morton’s Faith Comas (135), Oak Lawn’s Charvelle McLain (155) and Curie’s Aaliyah Grandberry (235).
Riverside-Brookfield’s Eleanor Aphay (125) was the lone area champion at Shepard.