This will be the final edition of the Pictures of The Week for the 2008 offseason as we start up the Jill of The Week feature next week with pictures and info of the 48 members of the 2008-09 Buffalo Jills. This week's Jills photo comes direct from Jills Director Stephanie M and features the women who guide the Jills through their training, their responsibilities, and on gamedays.
On the left, we have the Jills choreographer Kelli Wagner. Kelli took her current job with the Jills in 2002 and does more than turn heads at the Ralph on gamedays. She has successfully grown the Junior Jills organization into a coveted program for youth in Western New York and it’s surrounding areas. Kelli’s choreography has also been featured on Fox TV, ABC-Buffalo, several Buffalo radio station events, many community events, overseas military shows, as well as HSBC Arena-Buffalo. Kelli is the three time recipient of America’s Young Choreographer of the Year and has received numerous choreography and high score awards. In the middle is Jills Director Stephanie Mateczun and Steph spent a number of years on the sideline herself before taking the reins as Jills Director in 2002. Since then, the Jills have added on the Ambassador Squad, gotten more national positive recognition, many more appearance requests, and the Jills Swimsuit Calendar now includes every member of the squad. Other squads, even with their smaller numbers, only include a part of the squad on their calendars. Nichole Becker, on the right, is in her 3rd season as the coordinator after cheering through the 2000-2005 seasons, along with rookie squadmates Omarlla and Eileen. It was a new position created because of all the extra work that goes into the squad the past several years. Nichole was actually already performing some of the duties of coordinator her last few seasons as captain but the increased popularity and exposure of the squad caused the position of coordinator to become a full-time one.
From the Bandettes, we have a pic taken near the end of the 3rd quarter of the first game against the Minnesota Swarm. Incidentally, home games against the Swarm will be fewer and farther between as the NLL recently announced that Minnesota would be moving to the NLL's West Division. But I digress. This picture, taken just before the squad went out on the floor for their 3rd intermission routine, features Bandettes co-captains Melissa and Meghan with rookie Justina smiling for the camera. The smiles may have been from the way the game was going. After falling behind 9-6 at the half, the Bandits poured on 5 goals to none in the 3rd to hold an 11-9 lead at the time this picture was taken.
Continuing our look into the past at the Buffalo Bombshells, we see current Buffalo Bandette Korinne in a pic from the 2002 AFL season.
This week, we take a look at one of the Bandettes captains for the 2011 season as our Bandette of The Week. Melissa spent 7 seasons dancing during Bandits games and, in addition to spending this season as a captain, served as a co-captain from 2008-2010. Dancing since the age of 2 and cheering since Jr High, nothing makes her happier than performing on the field, though I'm sure her (sorry guys) fiancé is a close second. At the very least he keeps her laughing. Knowing about the Bandette of The Week feature that Melissa's been featured in more than anyone else, he asked me earlier this season if he could be the inaugural "Mandette of The Week" with his status as her fiancé. While I have no intention of focusing on the significant others of the Bandettes or the Jills on this site, hopefully Brad will at least enjoy this shout-out in Melissa's feature. When not dancing or spending time with Brad, Melissa is a development specialist coordinating fundraisers and working with non-profit organizations after graduating with honors with her degree in Integrated Marketing. Melissa's secondary photo comes from the Buffalo Men's Show that featured both the Bandettes and the Jills. Shown posing for the camera are Beth, Melissa, Lauren B, and Krista.
This week's Bandette of The Week is no stranger to anyone who's paid any attention to the squad at all the last few years. In her 6th season on the squad is Melissa, who's in her 3rd season as a co-captain on Meghan's line. She's been dancing since she was 2 and shows no signs of stopping anytime soon. And she shouldn't...when she's performing seems to be when she smiles the brightest. In addition to her experience and leadership on the squad, she's also contributed to NLL.com as a writer when squadmates have gotten named NLL Girl of The Week in the past. She earned a degree in communications 2 years ago originally looking into journalism but switched her focus to Integrated Marketing and currently works as a development specialist coordinating fundraisers and working with the non-profit organization that the foundation she works for supports. Her foundation's gain is the journalism industry's loss but hopefully we'll still see the occasional article from her on NLL.com with more NLL Girl of The Week write-ups. Last month, the NLL gave her the honor herself, an award a long time coming. Check that article out at http://www.nll.com/article.php?id=4402
This week, we take a look at 5th year vet Melissa as our Bandette of The Week. She's been dancing since the age of 2 and she's been cheering non-stop since Jr High school. Her first year on the Bandettes was during her freshman year in college. She's been working in community and public relations since graduation and she's even used the journalism education she received in college for the Bandettes. The last few years, when a Bandette has been selected as NLL Girl of The Week, Melissa has been the one writing about her squadmate. You can read more about Melissa at http://www.bandits.com/bandette-09-melissa.cfm
This is her 4th year with the Bandettes but she's been dancing for 19 years all totaled. Melissa is currently an advertising and PR intern but, as we saw last week in a pair of articles, she started off her college career pursuing a career in journalism. Not one to leave that completely behind her, she reported on the Bandettes' visit to Stone's Buddies and also put together the NLL Girl of The Week article for Erin Y. Whether she'll one day land a spot on one of the local stations one day soon remains to be seen but it's hard to imagine her straying far from Buffalo. She's a total Buffalo sports nut and has been known to take in a Bills game from time to time as well as the Bandits.
3rd year vet Melissa is a girl who'll never get tired of the spotlight, it seems. Besides the fact she's been dancing for 18 of her 20 years and cheering since Jr. High, she plans on getting in front of the spotlight in another way...as a TV news anchor. We can only hope one of Buffalo's stations has an opening at just the right time...so she doesn't wind up going elsewhere to pursue her goals. After all, why should some other city reap the rewards of getting another beautiful news anchor?
