Photo courtesy of Anna Freeman

The Georgia Southern Dance Team is a competitive dance team at the university. They currently have 19 members that perform at all the men’s basketball home games, and they compete at the National Dance Association nationals in Daytona every year.

On the side-lines, the team will do  short dances to music the DJ plays, and then they’ll have about a minute long choreographed dance routine at halftime where they’ll take the whole court, said Anna Freeman, president of the the Georgia Southern University Dance Team. Freeman added that sometimes Gus dances with them.

The team practices on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday for two hours and on Sunday for three hours.

During basketball season, the team learns routines for the games and works on their nationals dance routine, Freeman said. During the fall, they teach all the new girls the what they need to know for basketball games and do activities on campus, including the homecoming parade and around the community.

“We went [and] visited a nursing home this fall semester and just did a little pep rally for them,” Freeman said.

Freeman said the team is at the NDA nationals for four days and that it is a two part competition. The last day, after the team competes, they all go to the beach.

“It’s very rewarding because we put so much work into performing and then after we perform and compete we get to enjoy being together and all of our hard work,” Freeman said.

Freeman said the dance team has helped her maintain an active and healthy lifestyle.

“Everybody on our team is involved in other things as well, but dance team always comes first,” Freeman said. “Everybody is very dedicated and willing to set aside other things in order to put everything they have into the dance team.”

Audition information can be found on The Georgia Southern University Dance Team’s Facebook page.