Road to nationals: Club Dance Team heads to Daytona Beach for national competition

Alexis Schupbach
Wed, 30 Mar 2022 03:07:49 +0000
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Ohio State’s Club Dance Team will compete in NDA Nationals April 6-10, 2022. Credit: Courtesy of Jillian Zaffiro

The Club Dance Team at Ohio State will head to Daytona Beach, Florida, to compete in the National Dance Alliance’s national competition April 6-10.?

The Club Dance Team is less of a time commitment than the varsity dance team — which performs at other Ohio State sporting events — making it a great fit for students who want to continue dancing after high school but have busier schedules, Jillian Zaffiro, a fourth-year in computer science and engineering and vice president of finance for the club, said.?

“It’s a nice way to have a balance between school and other things, but also have, like, the stress relief and creative outlet of dance,” Zaffiro said.?

Due to the pandemic, the team has not been able to go to Daytona Beach for nationals since 2019. However, it did compete in the virtual division of the competition last year by sending in a recording of its performance, Zaffiro said.?

In a normal year, preparations for competition begin in the summer through the dance alliance’s camp — held this past year at the University of Louisville, according to the group’s Instagram — in which the team first qualifies for the national competition, Zaffiro said. Then, during the fall semester, the team holds auditions for new members.

This year, they added a boot camp for all team members following auditions, Zaffiro said. Because new members were not present during the summer qualifying camp, she said the team holds the boot camp over a weekend and models it after the qualifying camp.?

“It was a really good experience because it was the first time we had all danced for a long period of time together,” Zaffiro said. “It was really helpful, especially, like, getting the new members up to speed so we all mesh together well and we all look the same when we dance.”

Although the team did not begin working on its choreography for nationals until December 2021, Zaffiro said they performed at several campus events such as BuckeyeThon and Light Up the Lake in the meantime.

After winter break, the group began practicing nationals choreography and ramped up practices from two times a week to three, Zaffiro said. However, a new problem arose this year when Ohio State’s club meeting policy banned groups from meeting in person throughout the month of January, Molly Walsh, a fourth-year in speech and hearing science and co-president of the club, said.?

“We came back from Christmas break, and in the month of January, club sports said we weren’t allowed to practice, so we’ve just had all these setbacks since 2020,” Walsh said.?

The Club Dance Team, which Walsh said receives some funding from club sports, typically competes against varsity teams with more funding from their respective universities. However, she said they don’t let those disadvantages hold them back from competing.

“I think we all have this, like, inner drive that kind of fuels us,” Walsh said. “I honestly think that the lack of resources has kind of lit a fire under us.”

Walsh said the team plans to put all of its emotions and attitudes into its dance for nationals, which she said will be a jazz piece in a more flowy, “lyrical” style.?

“I think this piece, like the song and just our emotion and our attitude in the dance, speaks to just us all pushing through all of these setbacks and realizing that this team and dance is bigger than that,” Walsh said.?

The last two times The Club Dance Team competed, it ranked fifth in the nation. However, the team is not going into this year’s competition with any rank in mind, and Walsh said the goal is just to perform to the best of their ability.

“As long as we go out there and do it how we need to do it, like, we’re not even going to be upset with how we do because, like, we know in our hearts and as a team that we’ve done everything possible,” Walsh said.