On Wednesday September 4^th, 2013, the George Ranch Cheerleaders hosted the first ever community pep rally: The Longhorn Yell. Headed by the cheerleader coach, Mrs. Thomas, the cheerleaders began a new legacy, one that will be heard long after the screams and shouts of the crowd diminish.

Being the first ever community pep rally, many of the students at the school were unsure of what it was and what there was to do at this pep rally.

“The longhorn yell is a community pep rally so that everyone can come together to bring school spirit and spirit throughout the community,” senior cheerleader co-captain Rebecca Bandelle said. “We’re going to have a water balloon toss, we’re going to have the junior high cheerleaders perform, and the Lariettes are going to perform, as well as the George Ranch cheerleaders.”

The Longhorn Yell started promptly at 7:30 with a roaring introduction to all of the varsity football players and coaches, getting loud cheers from the band, cheerleaders, Lariettes, the crowd, and especially from the Ranch Rowdies.

The Ranch Rowdies is a revamped version of the student section, where the Ranch Rowdies are “a group of students who like to support their team and get down in the stands,” junior baseball player Jonathan Kastens said.

Will Gay, a senior baseball player, is part of the Ranch Rowdies. “We get the crowd going and the players going as well. I feel like they feed off of the energy we give off,” Gay said.

Following the introduction of the football team, the football captains came out to thank the crowd for all the support and urge them to continue to cheer them on at their future games. To get the crowd pumped, the pep rally took to an array of performances. The cheerleaders performed a cheer and a quick routine, the Longhorn band played the popular hit song from the movie Drumline, “Shout it out,” and the Lariettes performed a dance routine to Will.I.Am’s “Let’s Go.”

At every game, the cheerleaders try and ask the crowd to join them in some cheers; however, most of the crowd doesn’t know the cheer. Miss Erica Richards, the announcer for the Lariettes, taught the crowd 5 brand new cheers so the crowd can use them at the next football game.

Samantha Terrones leads the crowd and cheerleaders on a band favorite, Rollercoaster. This is where the participants wave their arms as if they were actually riding a rollercoaster. Following the rollercoaster ride, the crowd demanded to hear the drum line. After a crowd pleasing cadence, the Reading Junior High Cheerleaders gave a quick routine to the future crowd they will be cheering for in just a few years.

Looking forward to the future, young football players from the Greatwood Packers and the Grid Iron young football players ran across the football field, end zone to end zone to show off their strength, earning a round of applause from the stands.

With every pep rally, there always has to be a set of fun games to play. This particular game was the simple water balloon toss. Participants would toss the water balloon towards their partner and once they would catch it, they would repeat the process 5 yards back, creating a bigger distance between them. After a few tosses, the outstanding last toss was made by the Ranch Rowdie team of Cameron Boudroux and Jonathon Kastens.

To conclude the night’s event, everyone raised their Longhorns to the sky for the Alma Mater. After the contribution to the school, the band played the fight song as the varsity football team ran to the stands to give high fives to the crowd.

Many of the students, participants, and attendees were happy with the night’s events. Sabaha Ahkter, a senior and mascot at George Ranch, was looking at a legacy.

“It’s really exciting to start a tradition… and when I come back 10 years from now, it’s cool to know that maybe they will be doing the same things that we started,” Ahkter said.

Feeling pumped after the Longhorn Yell, Mrs. Leslie Haack, the principle of George Ranch High School, was pleased with the pep rally and was looking forward to the football season.

“I think it went very well; I didn’t know what to expect. I figured we’d have a pretty great turn out, because last Thursday was our first game, and when we’re the visiting game and we have a bigger gate than the home team, that tells you what we’re building here,” Haack said. “It’s great that we all came together so that we can learn how we do this together because we’re going to be doing this late November, early December, because we’re going all the way.”