Student signs to cheer for Dickinson State

Green River High School student Damien Holmes will be soaring to new heights - and helping the teammates he throws into the air do the same - when he becomes a Blue Hawk.

Holmes recently signed his letter of intent to cheer at Dickinson State University in North Dakota.

"I think it's wonderful," GRHS Head Cheer Coach Mikayla Smart said of Holmes's future opportunity. "It's incredible to have a kid of his caliber come from our school and be recruited at the level that he's being recruited at."

DSU is part of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics. Cheering for an NAIA school means Holmes will be competing in national competitions. 

"It's a higher co-ed level program," Smart explained of DSU's cheering program. "He'll be able to continue the skills that he's learned here and just progress and become better at what he's doing. And I believe they have a great academic program and he's going to get to really work on all of the things and just become better at his craft."

Someone else who is excited to watch Holmes keep improving is Allison Luna, the previous GRHS cheer head coach - especially since she was able coach him from the start. 

"I've known Damien since his freshman year," Luna explained. "It's been really cool watching him come from this little freshman boy who had a backflip but couldn't catch a girl and didn't know how to stunt, to doing all the crazy things he's doing now. It was really fun to help him grow and build and be a part of him going into college and talking with coaches and stuff. So it was really cool."

As Luna recalls, Holmes was a large part of the reason GRHS has had a co-ed cheer program the last few years. She said she had been debating whether or not to do co-ed, but her mind was made up once Holmes tried out - the first boy to do so that year. 

"He was so adamant, so eager, and really wanted to be a part of cheer," Luna explained. 

Holmes himself remembers that first tryout a little bit differently. 

"I believe I was on my way to wrestling practice my freshman year. And I really didn't want to do wrestling," he recalled. "One of my friends texted me like, 'Hey, come to cheer practice.' And I said, 'Are there gonna be any other boys there?' She said, 'Maybe.' And then I said, 'If there's no other boys, I'm not doing it.' But there were, like, three other boys. So I ended up doing it. And I just stayed doing it until now." 

Even if it's true that he was both the first boy to try out and that he needed the presence of other boys to reassure him, Holmes still ended up being a valuable member of the cheer team throughout his entire high school career, and he's excited to continue cheering at a college level. 

Holmes picked Dickinson State University after visiting the campus and meeting with the cheer team and coaches. 

"The team seems very close," he said. "The coach . . . will make sure I'm keeping on top of my stuff and she'll make sure that I'm succeeding in both college and cheerleading."

When it comes to what Holmes enjoys about cheer, the first thing to come to his mind was "throwing girls," along with doing flips and competing. 

When asked about the biggest challenge in cheer, Holmes's answer was immediate: 

"Throwing girls. It's not as easy as it looks." 

With all the challenges and rewards, Holmes is excited to keep cheering and to be part of the Blue Hawks' team. 

"He's gonna just continue to advance, he's not going to get stagnant," Luna said. "And not a lot of kids get to go to the college level or choose to go to the college level, so it's amazing. I'm so pumped to watch him."

"He's an incredible leader," Smart said of Holmes. "He can always do the things that he puts his mind to. He's going to be so successful when he moves on from here, but we are going to miss him a lot."