The World Series has been the hottest ticket in town, as legions of Milwaukee Brewers fans paid upwards of $2,000 for a seat for Game 1.
But some UW-Milwaukee students had an even better vantage point for the spectacle: The field.
Nearly two dozen dancers from the UWM HYPE Dance team performed on Friday at American Family Field during the World Series pregame ceremony, as 43,250 fans in the stadium and millions on TV watched.
The dancers were part of a crew of about 200 performers who flipped cards to spell out different dates while a narrator detailed the events that led the Brewers and Tampa Bay Rays to the World Series. Meanwhile, highlights from both team’s seasons played on the scoreboard.
It was an awe-inspiring experience. As she got to her spot on the field, Samantha Sarenac, co-director of HYPE and a junior majoring in accounting and Spanish at UWM, took a moment to gaze up into the stands and look around her at the players and her fellow dancers, all of them standing on the outfield grass.
“I don’t know if I can properly describe the feeling,” said Sarenac, who is from Greendale. “Just seeing that many people in all the stands and being so close to the players. I don’t think your brain can physically process it, that you’re in front of everyone. It just kind of feels like an out-of-body experience.”
HYPE’s experience began with an email from UWM Student Involvement two weeks before the World Series. The company staging the pregame performance, Backlit, was looking for people with performing experience to be part of the show. Sarenac lit up.
“I immediately reached out to my team, sent them the link, and I was, like, all right, I don’t know when this closes, but apply by Friday, and it’s Thursday,” she said.
Backlit was looking for individuals but jumped at the chance to work with the team. HYPE Dance is a student organization that practices and performs in hip-hop and other dance styles.
By Oct. 21, two days before Game 1, team members were rehearsing for the show.
And rehearsals were intense – three hours on Wednesday, four-plus hours on Thursday and another four hours Friday morning. They wanted to make sure they got it right in front of millions of people on one of the biggest stages in sports. The cards had to be flipped precisely, in exactly the right position at exactly the right time.
All the while, team members had to keep it all secret. Organizers didn’t want any details of the performance to slip out. But the dancers did have to let their teachers know they were going to be occupied for a few days.
On game day, they arrived at the ballpark for rehearsal at 8 a.m. They went back to the Baird Center for lunch and to hang out, then returned late that afternoon for the game.
Just before the performance, the dancers lined up in the tunnel leading to the outfield. The families of players and ballpark workers rushed around and past them, the air electric with excitement and anticipation.
“The energy was phenomenal,” Sarenac said.
Finally, they got their cue. The dancers filed onto the field, lined up and performed. They nailed it.
No, the dancers did not get to stay and watch the game from the stadium. They were ushered out right after the performance and driven back to the Baird Center to pick up their belongings.
They watched the Brewers win, 3-2, like the rest of us, on TV. But unlike us, they had just been on TV, on the field, part of the show.
