[cksportsfan]

As we speak, the KHSAA and KAPOS are talking about basically merging KAPOS into KHSAA. Cheerleading would be considered a full-fledged KHSAA sport; HOWEVER, KAPOS would be disbanded (at least on the high school level, KAPOS could still monitor middle school and elementary cheerleading).

There are hangups:

1) WHAT SEASON WILL CHEERLEADING BE?
Every current KHSAA sport is defined by a limitation of season. If you're a fall sport, it means July-November. Winter sport means October-March (and no cheering at football games or practices any time before). Spring would mean February-end of school. So while it may not be a big deal for serious cheerleaders, if cheerleading becomes a winter sport (and possibly include UCA nationals, see below) ... cheering at football games would not be happening for those girls. The coach of the football group and the money involved (paying for coach, uniforms, travel aka bus to and from games, food) would have to be two separate entities.

2) THE UCA/NATIONALS DEBATE.
While the KHSAA does not "forbid" nationals/out of state competition, per se, the UCA/nationals event at WDW/Orlando is a HUGE sticking point for some cheer coaches, parents, boosters and cheerleaders themselves because they see UCA and not KAPOS as the end-all, be-all. But what sport has nationals BEFORE the state competition (The 2012 UCA nationals were held BEFORE KAPOS state at Diddle)? None that I can think of. Plus, the KHSAA does have a rule -- in all sports -- that no regular-season events can be held once the postseason starts. UCA/nationals is NOT considered a recognized postseason event by the KHSAA (or the NFHS, which governs the KHSAA). So there's a HUGE scheduling issue to work around. So if you want to be a "real" sport, you might lose UCA nationals.

3) THE SCORING.
Only one other KHSAA sport, diving, uses human judges. And that's only one small part of swimming (there are like 14 events per gender, diving takes up two). Plus in diving, you know what your score is/was before the next diver hits the water. They announce it to the crowd and put it on the big scoreboard for everyone to see. Cheerleading (and marching band, drill team, dance team) likes to wait until the very end and then make one big announcement. KHSAA wants that changed. Heck, even in figure skating, Kristi Yamaguchi knew less than 10 minutes after she got off the ice if she got screwed (scoring wise) by the judge from Finland or Norway or whatever). So if KHSAA takes over cheerleading, no more wait-until-the-end scoring. It would likely be announced before the next team takes the floor (that way they know what they need to score; same thing in diving that Diver B knows he/she needs a XX.XX to beat Diver A). The postmeet team/squad holding hands in a circle/group would go the way of the dodo bird.

There are other minor issues, too.

STATS
Are there any that can be printed by the media OTHER than average competition score? EVERY other team sport has stats that can be broken down (even the newly acquired bowling). For the media, who you want on your side, stats are a GOOD thing. Yet, they seem non-existent in cheerleading.

ROSTER/UNIFORM
It's not hard to take a photo of a soccer, baseball/softball, basketball, volleyball kid and figure out who they are (because there are rosters which have their numbers). Swimming and track kids are assigned to specific lanes (or specific orders for relays), and track and cross country kids wear bibs. Cheerleading would be the one "sport" where identifying a competitor (for a writer or photographer covering the competition) is way too hard than it needs to be. Something needs to be done to rectify it, either by putting last names or jersey numbers somewhere on the uniform or giving them competition numbers on their hands (like track and cross country).

Let me say, personally, that cheerleaders are athletic as all-get-out (certainly more so than the bowlers I spent all winter giving plenty of coverage to). Cheerleaders work their tails off. And has been stated before, there are more cheerleading injuries "per capita" than any other high school sport.

Just like cheerleading, JROTC drill team, dance team, marching band (which has huge crowds like cheerleading, too, and puts in plenty of practice hours) have existed FOR YEARS without the need of having to be thought of as a "real sport."

That all being said ... is all the jumping through hoops and red tape REALLY worth it to be considered a sport?