Each year, a new senior takes the spot of “Student Section Leader” at football games, leading their peers in chants and cheers. This year, though not planned, Ben Prasifka became the “captain” of the students.

“I showed up to one of the games and just kind of became the leader,” Prasifka said. “Last year I saw Trent Davis doing it, and I thought it was really cool.”

All around LISD each high school knew who CP’s student section leader was, and Prasifka quickly became a “small-town celebrity.”

“It’s a cool feeling being known as the student section leader,” Prasifka said. “It’s not really anything special though. You just kind of show up to the games, do your thing and leave. It was fun and good to have the experience.”

Prasifka said his favorite games were state because of all the support and Vandy because of the intense rivalry between CP and the Vipers.  

“Everyone and their mother came out for the state game, so it was awesome to have that much momentum and spirit to work with,” Prasifka said. “For four years I’ve despised Vandy, and every senior around me at that game has lived with the memory of Vandy’s first time beating us. We went all out at that game, with fake money and plastic crowns and speakers to play songs.”

Traditions are carried on from year to year in the student section, and Prasifka kept some of them alive from years past.

“Some traditions that were brought back this year were the roller coaster, some of the chants the cheerleaders had and just having the student section leader is a tradition within itself,” Prasifka said.

With each chant that Prasifka used, he was trying to achieve his one goal, to get every student excited at each game and keep a humble attitude with every win.

“My goal was to get everyone hyped at each game,” Prasifka said. “I also tried to keep everyone respectful to the opposing team to be able to represent CP well inside and outside of school.”

There are responsibilities that come with being leader, although they are not very serious.

“You have to go to every game and you have to wear a bandana,” Prasifka said. “You must wear shorts and CP clothes too and have the Twitter account. At each game you have to make sure that you’re not too disrespectful to the other teams or else the APs will get on to you, but you also need to make sure that the student section is as loud as it can be.”

With all the responsibilities, chants and traditions, Prasifka will miss the student’s excitement the most.

“I’m going to miss everyone’s reaction when CPFB would score a touchdown; everyone would go crazy,” Prasifka said. “There’s a whole bunch of different chants I could do and just the whole experience was fun.”