HYRUM – When you go to watch a basketball game at Mountain Crest High School, you will notice there is more to watch than just the players on the court. Before the game you can spot senior Trevor Allsop donning a Darth Vader mask along with a personalized jersey which says “Dirty Trev” on the back of it.
So what does Darth Vader have in common with high school basketball? Not much, but that’s part of what makes the MC student section unique.
Typically before a home game Allsop will come out and lead the Mustangs in a cheer called the “Roller Coaster”.
“We pretend that we’re going on a roller coaster. To begin we put on our seat (harnesses) and we make a hydraulic sound, and then we all start stomping our feet to make it sound like we’re going on a roller coaster,” senior Tanner Richardson said. “It’s really fun to have, and to see the whole student body doing the same thing.”
With the student section seated Allsop stands in the front to lead them as they imitate a full roller coaster ride. When they first began doing the cheer, it mainly included the motions up, down, left and right, but over the season it has evolved.
“We’ve added a spin in it, and a lean back – we’ve just added some things that spice it up a little bit to keep it fun,” Allsop said.
During a game last week barf bags were added, but at the request of the administration they are no longer used.
The idea for the cheer came when some of the students went to the volleyball state tournament last November at Utah Valley University in Orem. They saw another school doing the cheer there, and decided to adopt it.
“We thought to ourselves if we could get everyone doing that, it would be pretty cool. We went and asked them (about it), and they had done it for a couple years so they had had some practice,” Allsop said. “So we thought if we could get our whole school doing that it would be cool.”
Allsop and his friends went home and began to do some research. After watching a few YouTube videos, they decided they wanted to introduce it at Mountain Crest. The cheer was introduced at a pep assembly and the students used the preseason as a time to practice.
All of this was done with some caution. If Valley rivals Logan or Sky View didn’t have a game of its own the same night, the students wouldn’t do the cheer to prevent another school from seeing it until the season began.
“We just wanted to be the best student section in the region. We wanted people to be scared to come play at Mountain Crest,” senior Rhyand Lund said.
Joining Allsop on the front row are senior Devin Speth, Rhyand Lund, and Nick Macriss dressed in orange and blue full body spandex suits.
“We got these our sophomore year. It’s kind of turned into a tradition at Mountain Crest that everyone dresses up in crazy stuff. It’s like Halloween,” Macriss said. “We just decided to take it to the next level with the suits.”
Before the season began, Allsop and his friends were trying to decide what he would wear to the games.
“Everyone has these suits and I thought I could dress up as a cowboy, because everyone always thinks of us as being cowboys,” Allsop said.
Allsop and his friends knew that they wanted it to be funny and something that no one else would wear. The idea to wear the mask eventually came at one o’clock in the morning, as they were playing Xbox and brainstorming.
At first Allsop wore the mask along with a shirt and tie. But he now wears a jersey with his nickname “Dirty Trev” on the back.
“People ask me are you a dirty kid, or do you not shower, but that’s not it at all,” Allsop said. “It’s just off a movie. It flows well – Dirty Trev.”
The students have been taking their cheers on the road as well. Especially when Mountain Crest plays at Logan or Sky View, the students have shown up in force.
“Our fans are great, the best fans in the state by far. They come to every game, even the away ones, they’re great. We love them,” junior Tyler Crosbie said.
Junior Faimafili Laulu-Pututau echoed Crosbie’s feelings about the student section being the best in the state.
“I love them, I think they’re a big part of our success,” Laulu-Pututau said.
“We love the support. They’re excited, they want to be a part (of the game). They want to support their peers,” MC head coach Graydon Buchmiller said. “It’s just an overall good feeling, and when you have that, especially at home, it just helps you relax and feel good.”
Allsop and his friends understand how the team can feed off of the fans support. Allsop, Lund, Richardson, and Speth all played football for MC, while Macriss is part of the swim team.
“We all know how much the student section can make a difference for your team, and we can tell the difference when they start going and we start going, we can tell it makes a big difference for the team,” Allsop said.
“We just want to have a good atmosphere and have people going crazy,” Speth said.
Macriss, Speth, and Lund said they plan to pass the spandex suits down to someone else at the last region game of the year. After they all graduate this coming spring they hope to see the student section stay as supportive and rowdy as it has been this year.
“We said it would be cool if we came here in 20 years to come watch our kids compete in sports, and we see them doing the roller coaster,” Allsop said.
The Mustangs have two games remaining in Region 5, including Friday night’s game against Bonneville, in Hyrum at 7 p.m. That will be Senior Night and Mountain Crest’s final home game.
“We know if our student section is in it that our team has a really good chance this year. We can go far with the potential they have,” Allsop said.
Currently the Mustangs are 7-2 at home.
Story by Jason Monson
Photos by Jerrics Osmun
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