OCEAN CITY — Dance teams from Cape-Atlantic League high schools will be hitting the big stage in a few weeks to compete at Disney World in Orlando, Fla. To prepare, the Ocean City High School dance team had its own competition Sunday morning.
Billed as the “First Annual South Jersey Dance Team Mock Competition,” a handful of teams from OCHS, Holy Spirit, Absegami, Middle Township and Lower Cape May Regional performed their routines in the main gym in front of judges who weren’t there to tally scores, but to provide critical feedback so the teams can hone their performances.
Alyssa Morrison, a dance teacher and dance team adviser at OCHS, hosted the event with her team.
She said the mock competition would help prepare them for the big stage because of all the support of friends and fans in the stands, the energy in the Dixie Howell Gymnasium and the judges.
“They’re going to get so much feedback and in the next 18 days their dances will evolve even more to get ready” for the national competition, which is Jan. 30.
This will be the third time Ocean City’s dance team is competing at nationals, but it will be the first for Middle Township, Absegami and Holy Spirit. Lower Cape May Regional isn’t competing at nationals but came to Ocean City’s event for that eventuality.
The five teams performed 10 routines over some 90 minutes in categories such as large group jazz and small group hip-hop.
“I was so nervous, but it was awesome,” Morrison said after the event. “This is just different than any kind of competition or show I’ve ever done, before we went to nationals, so hosting it was a little stressful. But after the first dance went off, I was like, ‘We got this.’
“It was very scheduled out. It’s very strict timing-wise, but I think everybody had a great time and I think it was fabulous. I loved it,” she said.
“South Jersey has such good dancers, and this whole UDA (Universal Dance Association) style helps them get ready for college teams, if that’s what they want,” Morrison explained. “There’s such amazing talent down here at all the different studios, but this style is very specific to dance teams.”
She added it was important for the camaraderie among the teams and to have a local venue where they can compete without traveling too far and having their support in one place.
Ocean City High School’s dance team started with her and her then student-organizers and now assistant coaches, Mary Grace Jamison and Kylie Kolmer.
“I’m absolutely so proud of them,” Kolmer said after watching the team perform. “Mary Grace and I actually started this team in 2020, and then the pandemic shut us down. Alyssa Morrison’s actually bringing this to life and what it is now is only literally what we could have dreamed of. It was so amazing.”
Kolmer said their goal when they started was to get experience so they could be on dance teams in college, but no one was promoting that in the area.
“Everywhere else, you could find high school dance teams that trained you for college and that was something we wanted to bring to our area. That it’s spreading like wildfire is honestly so crazy and amazing,” she said.
Kolmer went to Stockton University, where she was on the dance team and captained it for three of her four years. Now she’s the assistant coach at OCHS, teaches at Dance Dynamics in Ocean View, teaches spin classes at Revel and Ride in Margate and somehow manages to also be a cheerleader for the Philadelphia Flyers professional hockey team.
Aggie Becker, a co-coach of the Holy Spirit team with Hillary Mejia, was glad her girls got the chance to be at the mock competition.
“It was really special because I went to Ocean City High School, so it was really unique to see the choreography where I went to school. And it’s fun; we need this practice,” she said.
“The Ocean City dance team did something incredible for these South Jersey teams. We’ve never had anything like this before, and we’re really trying to have a presence in the dance competition community,” Becker said.
She and Mejia are preparing their girls for their first time at nationals late this month.
“Just between last week and this week, we made so many changes and adjustments and perfected the best we could. So without this performance, we would be right where we were last week,” Becker said. “No evolution, no progression or anything. So it’s great.”
Becker, who has a studio in Egg Harbor Township, Miss Margot’s Ensemble Arts, said they are excited to be headed to Orlando.
“These girls look up to these college teams and on social media; they’re just so excited to be in that arena,” she said.
– STORY and PHOTOS by DAVID NAHAN/Sentinel staff
