“Yes!” chant takes over student section

McKenna White

Junior Ryan Lauts cheers enthusiastically at a LHS home football game September 15th.

By William Yanek, Online Co-Editor-in-Chief

Yes!…..yes!….yes!…yes!.. yes! yes! yes! yes!

The LHS student section adopted the catchy “yes!” chant during the fall sports season. The chant is used to show enthusiasm and celebrate a positive play for LHS. It is now a signature of the student section, yet many students are unaware of its origins.

“I know the chant started with the senior class I’m pretty sure, but other than that I don’t really know [about its origin],” senior Christopher Ritter said.

The chant began to spread at LHS at the Fall Activities Assembly August 30, when English teacher Josh Hart led the student body in the chant before trying to imitate gymnasts in doing cartwheels.

“Students like to cheer and like to chant things and be a part of something, and also maybe it’s a bit ironic to realize it’s kind of goofy but it could be our thing, it could be fun, something to be known for,” said Hart, explaining why students might like the chant. “Or maybe they idolize me, that’s probably a part of it too, and I don’t deny that.”

The assembly crowd became entranced by the chant, and enthusiastically followed Mr. Hart’s lead. However, many in the crowd were perplexed as to where Hart discovered the chant.

“I love it, I actually personally know Josh Hart, the English teacher and it started when he did the cart wheels at the assembly and so every time I hear the yes chant I think of him,” senior volleyball and basketball player Hannah Stewart said. “I don’t [know about the origin], when he started doing it I was like ‘what is he doing’ but then everyone started doing it at the volleyball games and it just carried on.”

The “yes!” chant got its start in the WWE.

“For a brief amount of time I was a fan of professional wrestling, again in my later years in life it was wrestler Daniel Bryan, who did the yes chant as a way of connecting with the crowd,” Hart said. “I realize it’s kind of silly and strange but it’s something fun to do, shows enthusiasm.”

Athletes like Stewart get motivation from the chant and see it as unique to the LHS student section.

“It just gets us all excited about playing and all excited about winning the specific point in volleyball,” Stewart said. “No other school does it and so I feel like it’s unique to our student section and it hypes us up.”

Senior Jackson Hewins, a leader in the student section, also likes the “yes!” chant but feels like it can be used too much sometimes.

“I think it’s a good way to get the crowd involved when something good happens in a game,” Hewins said. “But you can’t do it too much, definitely people that try to overuse it.”

With the “yes!” chant in their arsenal, Stewart hopes the student section will continue to improve in creating a raucous environment at sports games and engaging with other student sections during the game.

“I like when we get involved with other student sections and we’re like ‘we can’t hear you’ or like ‘scoreboard’ or just making it a joke or kind of like entertaining to listen to,” she said. “When you’re playing a series of games it’s just kind of like fun to hear what’s going on in the student section.”