Jan. 24—BEMIDJI — It’s customary for dancers to maintain their straight faces at the end of an emotional jazz routine as they walk off the floor.
As the Bemidji High School jazz team finished their performance to Zach Bryan’s “Something in the Orange,” a song that describes a fleeting relationship with a significant other, the Blue Angels couldn’t help but crack premature smiles as they exited to the left of the bleachers at the BHS Gymnasium.
They knew they put forth a winning effort.
BHS bested four other schools to win the jazz crown in its first home competition since 2024. The Blue Angels did not have a home meet last season due to a judge shortage.
“It was fun; it’s always fun to compete at home,” head coach Krista Grover said. “They’re always more comfortable on their home floor. I think they get a little more nervous, but they get more energy from their crowd because they have more fans here. We don’t get as many on the road when we’re traveling, so it’s fun to have that energy.”
The Blue Angels were a razor-thin margin away from claiming a second first-place finish. They claimed the runner-up spot in high kick behind Bagley, trailing by 0.5 in the point-ranking totals.
In jazz, Hawley, Dilworth-Glyndon-Felton, Bagley and Moorhead followed Bemidji in order. Hawley, DGF and Moorhead trailed the Blue Angels in high kick.
“I didn’t get to watch everyone else, so I can only speak for what I saw from our girls, but they danced really hard,” Grover said of Saturday’s jazz routine. “They’ve been dancing together for a while. We had one girl who was sick and ended up having to sit last minute. They did a really good job of adjusting and making those decisions on the fly.”
“Something in the Orange” is a trickier song to dance to than the Blue Angels have picked in the past.
“It was a hard song choice,” Grover said. “It’s in 6s instead of 8s, which is harder to count. The musicality piece of it is harder, and judges will recognize that and it’ll boost the difficulty scores.”
BHS changed the pace in its high kick routine. It danced to a mashup of songs by Macklemore, a Seattle-based hip hop artist who rose to prominence in the 2010s.
“They just wanted to do something fun this year,” Grover said of the high kick music selection. “We’ve done a lot of themes in the past. They wanted something this year that they could have fun with.
“They did awesome. They had a lot of energy and they had a lot of fun. They were really pushing.”
When it comes to song choices, costumes and choreography, the Blue Angels’ leadership group has a say. The group consists of seniors Josi Volcke and Audrina Leach, juniors Elise Spaeth and McKenzie Benson and sophomore Brynn Konensfeld.
It’s a group that will be relied on heavily at the Section 4-3A meet on Friday, Jan. 30, at St. Michael-Albertville High School, especially in a different-looking section than it’s been over the last two seasons.
Sartell, Sauk Rapids-Rice and St. Cloud moved out of 4-3A, while Alexandria and Coon Rapids moved in. The top three teams in jazz and high kick will all go to state on Feb. 14 at the Target Center.
“We’re feeling good, but we still have a lot of work to do,” Grover said. “It’s going to be a tough week. It was kind of hard having those two days off before our home meet today. We’re going to be hitting it hard before we leave on Thursday. We only have three more practices left. . . We’ll do lots of drilling, cleaning. We did a lot of our last changes this past week. Now, it’s just clearing it up some more.”
