VOLGA – The host Cossacks took home the cheer title in the Sioux Valley Invite on Thursday evening.

Sioux Valley earned a score of 161.5.

“They did really well,” said Cossack coach Casie King. “We had one little bobble in the routine, but for the most part I was pretty happy with their performance. We always get a little shaky in front of our home crowd; they get nervous. But they did well.”

Sioux Valley senior Lauren Taylor agreed.

“Our team was very strong today,” she said. “After having a Class AA competition, it’s good to have an A competition and come back and perform for our home town.”

Deubrook Area was runner-up at 136.

Dell Rapids (135.5) and Faulkton Area (132) finished third and fourth, respectively.

Arlington/Lake Preston posted a score of 125.5 to take fifth. Redfield/Doland (113) was sixth.

Sioux Valley’s annual invitational featured another big crowd in the Cossack Center.

“I feel like they actually put more importance on this than a lot of our really big competitions because so many (people in) our community don’t really know what we do, so it’s important for them to show everybody what we can do,” King said.

Added Taylor about competing at home, “It’s pretty fun. A lot of the A teams don’t usually get to have home competitions, but in our town we get to have a lot of them and they appreciate it.”

Sioux Valley is the 11-time defending Class A state champion – it’s won every year since the sport was sanctioned by the SDHSAA in 2007.

Thursday marked the Cossacks’ fourth competition of the season and they have four more to go before state, which is Oct. 19 in Brandon.

“We’re sitting pretty well,” King said. “We’ve been making adjustments to our routine every week and we’ve been working on some improvements, but for the most part they’ve been doing really well. They haven’t actually had a routine where they haven’t hit it, so we’re pretty happy with that.

“We have some difficulty that we’re trying to add in, although I feel like we have pretty significant difficulty (already). But we have a lot of cleaning to do in our routine and that’s kind of what we’ll be focusing on. We have kind of a young group that gets a little nervous on the floor, so just getting more calm on the floor.”

Sioux Valley has seven seniors on the roster – Beylee Bezdichek, Sara Duncan, Caley Gruntmeir, Cheyanne Kamps, Dani Seibel, Ashlyn Spilde and Taylor.

“The season’s been good so far,” added Taylor. “We’ve had two first-place, a second and a third – and that’s along with the AAs. On Tuesday we go to O’Gorman and we hope to do well there.”

In dance, Northwestern had a hip hop score of 116.5 and a pom score of 114.5.

The Dolphins return to action at the Dakota Valley Invite on Saturday at noon.

The Cossacks compete in the Sioux Falls O’Gorman Invitational on Tuesday at 5:30 p.m.

The Badgers head to Mitchell for the Corn Palace Invite on Saturday, Oct. 6, at 10:30 a.m.

Register photos:

Above, the Cossack competitive cheer team performs its routine during the Sioux Valley Invite on Thursday evening in Volga. The hosts earned a score of 161.5 to take the team title.

Below 1, Arlington/Lake Preston performs. The Badgers posted a team score of 125.5 to take fifth.

Below 2, Deubrook Area goes through its routine en route to earning a score of 136. The Dolphins placed second.