MIDDLEBURY — The Middlebury Union High School dance team posted a second-place finish in Hip Hop and a third in Jazz on Saturday, when the Tigers hosted their only home competition of the season.
Teams from seven schools competed in three categories. Lamoille swept Hip Hop and Jazz, and South Burlington, one of two teams to participate in Pom, won that category.
Panels of three judges rate teams on 10 elements of each of their presentations: Execution of Movement, Execution of Skills, Synchronization/Uniformity, Spacing, Communication/Projection, Creativity/Musicality, Routine Staging, Complexity of Movement, Difficulty of Skills and Overall Impression.
Teams are then ranked numerically on each element on a scale of 1 to the number of teams in each competition. If there are five, as was the case in Saturday’s Hip Hop discipline, each team receives a rating of 1 through 5 for each element of their presentation, and the judges use those to determine an overall ranking.
Using those, Lamoille excelled in both Hip Hop and Jazz. In Hip Hop, the judges awarded Lamoille all 1s, except one 2 in Communication/Projection.
The judges also smiled on the Tiger dancers’ Hip Hop efforts, rating them second across the board and awarding them 12 1s across the three judges — at least one 1 in every category except Spacing and Routine Staging.
The scoring in Hip Hop thus ended up Lamoille, 3; MUHS, 6; Burr & Burton, 9; North Country, 12; and Missisquoi, 15.
In Jazz, six teams competed, and the Tigers edged South Burlington for third. Lamoille ruled with another 3, followed by Colchester, 6; MUHS, 10; South Burlington, 11; Burr & Burton, 15; and North Country, 19.
The Tigers received a number of 2s in Jazz, for Execution of Movement, Synchronization/Uniformity, Communication/Projection, and Overall Impression.
Three dates remain in the Tigers’ dance card: this Saturday at South Burlington, the NVAC championships on Feb. 8 at Mount Mansfield, and the state championship competition at Vergennes Union High School at 5 p.m. on Feb. 15.