By: MacKenzie Butler
LEESBURG, VA- He may not be the tallest sophomore around, but he sure makes up for it in school spirit. Sixteen year old Kyle O’Connor has really helped create a tradition at Tuscarora High school, and it all began at Heritage.
After attending Heritage previously, O’Connor looks back and notes how “THS is stricter when it comes to rules. Overall it is a great school, but [it] needs more spirit”. Before you argue that, ask yourself: “Did I dress up for any spring Spirit day?” If your answer is yes, then good for you! If no, well, then you need to work on that. Kyle explains that “I love school spirit” and this helped prompt his creation.
“Well, Travis Mitchell, Amanda Presgraves, Ian Siepel, Ryan Bleull, Garret Mastria, and I got together and talked about possible names for a cheering section. We thought of Terror because it works with Tusky: Tusky Terror,” says O’Connor. Their first successful attempt to create this Tusky Terror section was “the football game against County. We all decided to do a white out and told everyone about it. Then we started to do blackouts, and it has stayed. Now we have blackouts at football, volleyball, and basketball games.”
The cheering section you see at the sports games now has the name of Tusky Terror, and shirts can be purchased to go along with it. Tuscarora has a tradition. O’Connor’s inspiration to start something like this came from “my older brother, Kenny. He helped start Heritage Havoc with a few of his friends, my sister Kerrin carried it on, [and] then my brother Kevin kept it going. So, I wanted to carry on the tradition and start something at this school.” It runs in the family, and will now run in Tuscarora for years to come.
You can catch Kyle in several places: in the bleachers decked out in school colors cheering our school team on, attending an FBLA meeting, running a few miles for the cross country team, or even cradling a lacrosse stick down the field. But his favorite thing about this school is simply “Lunch. It’s food, it’s good, and you get to chill at the tables. Oh, and gym is nice.” For a busy guy, he likes the simple things, and that’s including goals for his high school career.
“I’m excited for the upcoming years because I will be an upperclassmen and it will be fun. I mean, being a sophomore right now is also fun, because I feel older since there are no seniors.” That is going to be a common theme for O’Connor in the upcoming year and eventually senior year. He says, “My motto is have fun and pass school. One of my main Have Fun goals is by senior or even junior year, I want to have a full student cheering section.” When asked if he has any other goals, he adds,”Oh yeah, and to graduate”. Let’s hope he succeeds in both his goals.