Which teams get the most admiration in our featured team interviews?

by Norm Ramil / 8ca.dance.fan

We’ve interviewed dance teams and written about their season stories on this blog since 2016. As you can imagine, certain teams come up over and over again in the conversation. One of my favorite questions to ask a team is which other teams they admire the most.

Dancers mentioned the elite and exalted University of Minnesota Dance Team 15 times over the past three seasons! That’s actually not too surprising and kind of a no-brainer. So let’s get to the Illinois high school teams…

Crushin’ it (and just one behind Minnesota) is Geneva with an amazing 14 different teams mentioning them in their interviews over the past three seasons. Next highest with an impressive 9 mentions is Neuqua Valley.

Tied for 3rd place are Lake Zurich and Lake Forest, each with seven different teams giving them praise in 8CA interviews since 2016. What’s cool about LZ and LF is that their reputations go back into the 2000s, and their success over the decades goes beyond just their UDA appearances.

Another program that’s rocked the competitive dance scene for a long time is Lake Park, and you guys have definitely noticed what they can do on the floor every weekend. The Lancettes got mentioned by six different teams.

Up next is a group of high-level teams that each got tagged 5 times over the past few seasons: Lincoln-Way West, South Elgin, Stevenson, and Warren. The cool thing about this is that dance teams are still inspired by hip hop just as much as jazz, even though one of those styles dominates the competition floor.

The teams that can boast four mentions by other dance teams are diverse in terms of location, school size, and dance style. Highland, Morris, Minooka, Fenton, and Maine South all have admirers from around the state.

In another example of the widespread respect for both hip hop and jazz, Eisenhower, Libertyville, Huntley, and York each earned that hearts-for-eyes emoji three times from other teams interviewed on this blog.

The teams that got two shout-outs over the years are Grant, Glenbard North, Genoa-Kingston, and Andrew–another super interesting mix!

And while it might seem that getting mentioned by just one other team isn’t a huge deal, think about what it takes to perform so well that a dancer on another team thinks of you when asked, “Which other teams are you a fan of?” I mean, it’s pretty easy to blurt out, “Minnesota!” So props goes out to these teams, each of which received a rhetorical high-five from another team when interviewed by 8CA:

Antioch

Crystal Lake Central

Edwardsville

Fremd

Glenbrook South

Joliet West

Lemont

O’Fallon

Oak Forest

St. Charles North

Streamwood

Vernon Hills

Villa Grove

Wauconda