Knightline dancers are going to be absent from hallways and classrooms until Wednesday Feb. 5. The JV and Varsity dance teams will both be in the place where dreams come true, Disney World. They are competing at the National Dance Team Championships.

“I’m really nervous because it’s my first national dance team competition, but I’m super excited because I think we have a good chance of winning,”  JV Knightline dancer Maya Kelch said. “It would be really cool to be nationally ranked, and representing Francis Howell North as a nationally ranked team.”

Knightline qualified through the Universal Dance Association (UDA) Elite camp they attended during the summer. Both teams have faced a rigorous schedule of four to six practices a week, focusing on dance technique to get their dances nailed down before the compete.

“We’ve worked really hard and I feel like we’ve been just trying to accomplish everything we wanted to do better on so we can do well,” Varsity Knightline Captain Hannah Chowning said.

Upon arriving at Disney World on Friday, the dance teams will practice and attend team dinners. Semi’s starts early Saturday morning with the girls doing their hair and makeup, then catching the bus to the venue where the competition will be held. Once there, the competition coordinators take the competing teams through a 20 minute warm up, and then the competition begins. If Knightline places in their dances during Semi’s they will move on to Finals, which take place on Sunday.

“We have the talent, and the ability, to make finals,” Varsity Coach Tammy Rockita said. “It’s just hard to crack it, so North has never cracked into finals, and that’s definitely their goal, and as their coach, I believe that both teams can do it.”

Knightline will be competing against teams from around the area, including Howell and Central, including other teams that have been attending Nationals for years and are nationally recognized. According to Chowning, Knightline has competed against similar teams before, and have won, so they know they’re going up against fierce competition.

“It would just mean the world [to win] because all of our goals will have been reached and all of our dreams will come true,” Chowning said.