The Sunday Story Presents: Buffalo Extreme
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One year ago in Buffalo, New York, a white man drove three hours from where he lived. He went to a supermarket in a mostly black neighborhood, and he killed 10 people. All of them were black. Not far from that supermarket is a gym where kids, mostly black girls, learn competitive cheerleading. To be clear, the gym is not where the shooting happened, but that's the thing about mass shootings. They don't just affect the people who were there. They affect everybody in a community.

I'm Rachel Martin, and this is The Sunday Story. Today, we're bringing you the first episode of Buffalo Extreme. It's a new series from our colleagues at Embedded. For the last year, Embedded has been talking to the athletes from this gym, their coaches, their moms, and asking a lot of hard questions. Today, these girls and the women who support them will tell their stories of what it's like to try and make sense of all this race and hate, but also love and community.

The series is hosted by Nakia McCann. She's 19 years old and a college student now, but Nakia grew up in the Buffalo gym, competing as a member of the cheer team. Nakia McCann joins me now. Nakia, hi. Thanks for being here. Thank you. I guess the starting point is just really very, very simple. I mean, this awful thing happened in the community where you're from.

But it's a different choice to say, I want to take this awful trauma and I want to explore what it meant for people in the broader community, not just for people who are in that grocery store.

Why did you decide this was something that spoke to you, something that you needed to do? I learned that there were a lot of people in my position which were people that weren't directly impacted because they didn't lose a family member, but they did lose the sense of being safe. A lot of people didn't talk about it because they felt as if

Their opinions didn't matter because they didn't lose anybody close to them. So I essentially stepped up to the plate and wanted to get our story and my story across to everyone that, especially after something happens like this, everybody's story is important because it affects everyone. What did you learn that surprised you when you started talking to people about how this affected them personally? What honestly surprised me is that

everybody pretty much had the same feelings and opinions and views that I did because I honestly felt alone. I felt like, you know, how I felt nobody else didn't feel or like, you know, I don't have a right to feel the way I do. But over the course of time, like, you know, doing the interviews and just having like one-on-one conversations with like other people, it just brought a sense of relief. Like, you know, we're all feeling this domino effect of something that

tragically happened and that was out of nowhere. Was it hard to get people to open up and talk? It's definitely, it still is hard to get people to open up and talk. And it's hard to get them to open up about something so traumatic and tragic because usually when something like that happens, you want to just be like, you know, it's fine. It's okay. I'm going to push it aside. Like that's how. Yeah. Let's move on. Yeah. Like a lot of people, their coping mechanism is just like, you know, forget about it. I'll be fine.

So the hardest part was having them bring those feelings back up and resurface them and break it down to me and actually try to... And not just give, like, I was sad when it happened. It was more like, okay, but you were sad, why? Or you were sad, can you give me a picture? I mean, was that hard for you? Here you are processing your own pain about it, but then...

I mean, it's hard, right? Being the reporter and you're trying to distance yourself, but at the same time hearing other people make you feel less lonely, but also resurfaced your own pain. Yes, there's been a lot of times where

there's pieces that I have to narrate or like there's pieces that I had to do like interviews and I'm just like, you know, I need a break or we had to do it like multiple times because it's hard to mentally and emotionally bring it back up because it's like, you know, I feel how they feel. If there was one thing that you would want listeners to take away from this project, what would it be?

Honestly, I feel like what I want somebody to take away from listening to this project is no matter what has happened around you, it's your fight. Everything affects you. And to definitely never feel like you're alone with anything because you can confide in your community, which I've definitely been learning.

Nakia, thank you for talking with us. Thank you so much. And with that, here's the first episode of Buffalo Extreme. New episodes will be released every other week and listeners can find the rest of the series in the Embedded podcast. Here's Nakia. My cheer journey started very early.

I wasn't as tall then. Just two little pigtails, two puffballs. I had like the biggest knockers in my hair. They're like little balls that you loop around your hair. Like it was yellow and it had smiley faces on them. Those were my go-to knockers. I cheered for a little rec team with basic skills like a roll and potentially a cartwheel, but I just wanted to tumble and like jump around and have, you know, fun with other girls until I slowly started getting into it more seriously.

I didn't know nothing about the chair world at all. So my mom started researching gyms that we could go to that were affordable. And that's how we found this small gym on the east side. It wasn't even a gym, honestly. It was like an after-school program where kids do their homework. You could tell it was kids in there because the walls were dirty. If you have cousins and they smear their hands on the wall, that's exactly what it looked like.

Despite all of that, there was still an all-star team there. It was called Buffalo All-Star Extreme, but for sure we call it base. I remember walking in, and the door was so heavy, it immediately slammed. And a random woman with red lipstick, short haircut, like Mohawk haircut, she was like, oh my God, what are you doing? One, three, jump, five!

She was directing kids around. She had on these red hoop earrings and they were like bedazzled too, with a bedazzled bow. I'm like, just like just bedazzled all the way down. I was a tall, lanky girl. Didn't know anything. Feeling like, do I really belong here or should I just go? That lady became my coach.

Do you remember, like, when I first came to base? You? Yeah. Our first season. So what do you remember? That you had a big head. A little bitty body and a big head. Her name is Ayanna Williams-Gaines, also known as Coach Yanni, but I call her Auntie Yanni. The reason why I do base today is because of y'all. My beautiful brown kids, like, that's what it is. Like, I feel like, you know, those are my kids.

Let's welcome the pro all-star extreme superheroes for small youth. I was one of Coach Yanni's first brown girls, but now she has hundreds of brown girls just like me to cater to. If you don't know what competitive or all-star cheer is, it is not girls cheering on the sidelines. It's actually...

a team full of girls that cheer for themselves and compete against teams all over. When you're at a cheer competition, you see them like flipping and their legs are up in the air. You'll also see girls doing a pyramid. Think of like smushing every person on the team together to make one big cheerleader. It kind of feels like a roller coaster, but instead you're not moving. You're watching everybody else move.

When you're a cheerleader, you always have to have that fierce look. You always have to have that fierce attitude. You know, you never want to show any sign of weakness. You need confidence in yourself, but it really comes from your team. In case you haven't put the puzzle pieces together, we are not typical in the cheer world at all. We get stares, we get looks, we get, you know, smart remarks. Oh, here comes the black girls. The black jump. I hated that. And like they would say on our score sheet, like,

Our moves were like too over the top. We're just dancing the way we dance. Too much hips and too much face. All-star chair world is pretty much like it's a white girl world. So they're used to seeing stick figures. We're not going to move the same. There was competitions where we heard people say black girls should not be on the mat.

And then, you know, like with us, all of us being black girls, our confidence started going down because of that. Like my confidence as like a cheerleader and like a person, I was like, bro, I don't know. I want to be here. I don't want to be here one. And it was like, I don't want to be a black girl.

Even with the head turns and the remarks from adults and judges and kids, my coaches and our parents made sure that you feel welcome. We heard it so much that I became a shield. Like, I'm not about to let y'all go out there without me. You made us believe that small black girls like just us. Yeah. Like, you make us feel like top tier. Y'all are so dope. We can feel so top tier.

We were always safe, whether we were safe because our cheer coaches were protecting us or our moms were protecting us. We knew that at the end of the day, we were safe from anything until a year ago. A year ago, a white man came to our community and shot our people. Our gym is three blocks away. I was scared. Like, I can't protect you. Not only did we lose our people,

but we lost a lot of other things as well. To understand what we lost, you have to know about my little cheer gym on the east side of Buffalo. What do you think about this whole recording thing? Is this like weird? I'm still nervous about all of this stuff. I am Nakia McCann, an OG of Buffalo All-Star Extreme, and this is our story. Yeah, let's go. So now we're going into base.

I wonder if my auntie here. Okay, so hi, I'm Nakia. Hi, guys. I am in college now. Hi, Auntie Yanni. You know my time on the mat is done. I do my share with these babies. I call them my babies. I'm trying to tell you if I see flex feet next competition, because you always have your feet flexed. Ever since you was little, like ever since you first started cheering. Base started at a tiny rec center and has now expanded to a huge gym with all

over 10 cheer teams. - Where's our cheer shoes? - The kids definitely range from about like four all the way up until senior year. - Coach Yanni calls me Sunshine. - Auntie Yanni now coaches the youth team. - My nickname is KK. - My cheer name? - Susie. - Cupcake. - My other nickname is Mike's daughter because my dad's name is Mike. - Five, six, seven, move one, three. I said don't bend, go back. - You're gonna hear a lot of voices throughout this. - You know that was you, Mike's daughter.

But there's a couple people I want you to remember. Like Milani. Hi, I'm Milani. Everybody calls me Lani. A.K.A. Hamster. My nickname to this day is still Hamster because all I did was roll. Everybody else had a cartwheel around of me. I was like, I'm not doing that, Coach Ani. I'm doing a roll. She also has the pleasure of having my mom as her coach.

You're also going to hear Nysera. This is Nysera. The one that says, hi guys. Hi guys. Milani and Nysera even did their own recording. Hello. Hi. What's up? This is Lani. These girls have their own cheer pictures, their trophies, their medals. So. Welcome to my presentation. I have my first medal. It is...

white and blue and it says the one. - Nyceria is a living now. - These are the ones that I got for standing out like myself. So I got the win. - Hurry up. - Lakisha is Nyceria in Cupcakes, mom. - Y'all running late.

Yes, you are. LaKeisha is always at every competition. For the elite cheerleaders, I don't know what the new team name is this year. And she makes sure that our videos are perfectly recorded. This is how they looked at the end. As you see, it's full of energy, a lot of smiles, a lot of jumps, and there's her uniform. A dazzling blue skirt with red stripes along the side with rhinestones, shimmer. ♪♪

Put your hair back on the pointe, so let's go. A role of a base chair mom. Put your jackets on, ladies. I've seen them literally not only take care of their kids and their teams, but...

They also provide that stability for the other kids. Everybody put their seatbelt on. Wears everybody's lipstick, wears everybody's uniform. You know, I have enough snacks, so. Let me just say, my life revolves around y'all, but there has got to be some time for me. Like, I couldn't even have five minutes in the bathroom to myself. One weekend we in New Jersey, the following weekend we in PA. So our chair moms are definitely, they're definitely like the STEM kids.

And the cheerleaders to me are the flower. A year ago, we were getting ready for our new cheer season. And May 14th, that was the registration day.

It's a whole day dedicated to the cheerleaders to find out what team that they're going to be placed on, meet their coaches. And Yanni always makes the interest in like pop balloons to find out what team they're on. So it was definitely set up to be a good energy filled day with, you know, smiles, laughter, you know, talking and laughing with coaches and old veterans. But that day slowly flipped upside down. I had just came back from college and that morning I

My granddad called my mom and asked if on the way to base, can we stop at Topps and get him a watermelon? Hey, could you go to the Topps on Jefferson and get me a watermelon? My mom remembers every detail about that day. For some reason, they get the best watermelon. So I was like, yeah, I'll get it. We'll go to base and then get the watermelon. And then like, never mind. I said, we'll go to Topps first. Usually I will go down like Fillmore and cut up Utica to go to Topps.

And I passed it. So I'm like, mom, we're going to tops. Like, why are you missing your turn? So like, I ended up going down Delavan to Jefferson and I missed Jefferson. And I said, what the heck? She basically like goes around and she missed it again. So I'm like, now you're missing the turn twice.

So then I turned down Main Street and I cut up Mastin. And then I was just going to cut over to go to Topps. And as soon as we got there, it was this mayhem. You can hear people in the parking lot screaming. And I was like, what is going on? So I'm like, whatever happened, we'll just have to go later. So then I passed Topps to go to Bass. And as soon as we pulled up at Bass...

Another coach came out and had tears and she was like, "There was a mass shooting at Topps." That's how we found out. Kya looked at me and she was like, "We were supposed to be there. I would have been in Topps and she would have been in the car. If I would have died in there, she would have been alone in this car by herself." For the first time, I felt like somebody just squeezed my heart and was just like, it was a shock. When it first happened,

We definitely did feel like, okay, we could be potentially targets, so let's lock the gym door and make sure that everybody was inside that chair gym. We did lock the doors because we didn't know what was happening and you can hear like just sirens from every direction. We had the big windows and like just looking out. I think I've seen every police car that the city of Buffalo ever had.

And it's like, you know, as adults, we're like trying to calm these kids down. Like, no, like, you know, something happened. We don't really know, but we're all fine. We're all safe. But in the back of our minds, knowing like, are we safe? I was stone cold speechless. Like, we're two and a half blocks away, three blocks away. Like, what am I supposed to do? I can say that that was the first time I ever saw Auntie Yanni not know what to do. I was literally like, God, I cannot protect these kids.

I went home that night and I didn't even want to touch my phone, honestly. It seemed like everywhere I turned, my phone was flooded with what happened. And I couldn't sleep. Like, nothing made sense. But I do remember, like, texting my mom and asking her, like, hey, are you up? It was about 2 o'clock in the morning. And she was like, wow, like, I never thought that this would happen.

I think after the Tops incident is when she really started to put two and two together, how segregated the city of Buffalo really is. It is segregated. And she was like, and how segregated is that that he would know to go to that Tops? And I was like, yeah. And she's like, I just keep thinking about, do you think something like this will happen again? Do you think that, like, what about, like, base? Like, she was like, that's a predominantly Black community.

cheer and dance company. She was like, what about that? Like, is it safe? I mean, she was crying and I was just like, you know, I don't know. I wish I knew. I wish I knew in that moment to say like, oh, you know, it was just this and everything's going to be okay. And then like, you know, we'll have a vigil and we'll volunteer down there and we'll feel 100% better. And that's not reality.

And she was like, mom, that's like the scariest thing of everything. How do you not know? I said, because I don't know. I don't know, Kaya. I said, I'm sorry, but I don't know. And she was like, okay. When something like the Tops Massacre happens, it's not just one big blob of emotions, you know, automatic sadness. Like, for example, Coach Yanni, it takes her a long time to come to terms with a lot of things emotionally. Like...

She's the CEO and she's also a coach. So I feel in this time when the Tops massacre happened, it really took her a long time to come to terms with it. I'm like seeing the tears from other people and I'm like, oh, wow. And I still didn't get it. I don't even know how I got home.

Aunt Fiani lives in the suburbs. Nicer houses. You could play in the backyard, the front yard. She's also one of the only Black families in her neighborhood. I've never been uncomfortable, ever, ever. In 20 years, I've lived in the suburbs. But that day... I remember me and my fiancé saying, we have to go to the store. And everything made me jump. Every white person made me jump. Anybody in fatigue made me jump. And I'm like, I'm not okay.

She didn't realize how big of an impact it would have on her emotions and then also the emotions of the coaches, emotions of parents. The next day, she also had a fundraiser. I remember someone asked me, are you going to cancel the banquet? I'm like, hell no, I'm not canceling the banquet. And one of the, Darryl comes up to me, which is my fiance, he goes, I just asked this guy, was he okay? Because he looked like he was down. And he goes, no, my mom just got killed. I go, just like that?

He goes, "Yeah," he was like, "But he said it was yesterday." And I'm like, "And then it happened again. Someone was leaving early." I go, "Why are you leaving so early?" She goes, "Oh, her uncle got, he was part of the Jefferson 14ers." I was like, "Huh?"

And then I found out more and more and more, and I'm like, why are so many of my kids affected? Duh, Ayanna, your gym is 14209. He did his research on the entire zip code, and we are a part of that. Everyone in that community is who I served, and that was their tops, that was their grandparents, that was their cousins. Yeah, it was bad. It was bad. I don't know why it took me so long to get it, but then at that very moment, I just...

I just started crying. I'm like, oh my God. I'm like, why did I host this banquet? Why did I do this? Like, I should have canceled. People had to sit at funerals and watch people get buried into the ground. Nycera lost one of her great aunts. I did not want to go to the funeral. I did not want to go. Like, I didn't think I really wanted to see her body inside of a casket. I didn't have to go through that. My mom didn't want me to go through that. So she didn't take me to the funeral because...

I told her I was scared. That's been the priority for the last year is just making my children feel safe. I struggled, you know, getting out the house for a minute. I struggled with a little bit of depression, but it was only because I was thinking about it. And in actuality, I wasn't the victim. It was like, you got to move on. You got to, you just got to be better and hope that this doesn't happen again. I think the hardest part

of being a chair mom and a base mom and just a mom in general was knowing that they couldn't protect us, you know, their daughters. They couldn't do anything to stop what was going on. It felt like I was being pushed between two pillows sometimes. Cupcake was on one side clinging onto her. She held my hand everywhere just like Nycera did. She was basically smushed in the middle trying to protect and comfort them.

both at the same time. I was like, oh my God, please stop because I can't deal either and I'm trying to hold it together so y'all can hold it together and I'm not trying to show no weakness because I'm a mom and, you know, we got feelings and you don't want your kids to see you at your weakest moment and that day, like I said, it just, it took a lot. It took a lot. I still, I still try to remain strong. I never want my kids to see me cry. I'm sorry. I didn't get emotional.

Because my mom is so tough. And my dad is so tough. It's like together buff. Mommy know what buff mean. That's why she laughed. Other people have lost way more than me. So even though I had the right to feel bad, you can't say that you're so angry and all this and all that when you weren't the one who got shot. Even if you feel like you weren't close to it or you weren't there, you didn't lose anybody, kid-wise, I feel like we all have something that we lost in common.

We know the word is not lollipops and gumdrops. In our city, we know it's not. But the lollipops and gumdrops that we did have came crashing down that day. I've never been somewhere where, like, people are literally racist. Like, they go and say, I don't like you, I'm going to shoot you because you're black. I'm sure Nycera saw things that she should not have seen or been exposed to. And she was only 10 at the time.

He was going live on Twitch. He was video recording it. It was just crazy to hear that what I was seeing that was graphic to me, that kids below me were also seeing that were very, very graphic to them. He had Army stuff on, and some people were looking, thinking that that was the Army, and didn't realize that they were about to die. They were sitting down saying, "Please don't shoot me," and he just walked around and shot all the black people.

The Monday after the massacre happened, Nysera amongst a lot of other girls, they saw the world definitely in that black and white. We came off of our bus and we just, every black kid on the bus was just looking out the window and everybody was out there with Black Lives Matter shirts. It made it feel like now y'all want to support us because people dying.

We go up to our classroom, everyone's talking about it, and our teacher asks for us not to talk about it. Now, one kid literally, like, they get up from their seat and walks out the classroom, and the teacher asks us what's wrong, and someone was like, they lost their grandma. And then somebody else said, how do you expect us to not speak about it? There were a lot of Buffalo kids that got into fights and arguments that week.

I think she was trying to make people feel better. And I told the teacher, I was not trying to be rude in any way, but I told her, don't get mad at me because I'm speaking facts because you don't know what happened. And I got in trouble, but I didn't care because I was standing up for the black people because she wasn't the one who went into a Topps Market, got her head shot open, got shot in their stomach, wasn't laying down, still got shot. A week after the massacre,

I asked Auntie Ani if I can do some type of prayer circle or even just a sit-down circle with some of the girls. And I was just like, if we can get them in the gym, sure. We didn't think anybody would come back to the gym because you know how close we were. I just put it in the Facebook group that I'm about to have a circle if anybody wants to come and talk about

It's not mandatory, but I want you guys to know that somebody is here. You can say one word and leave. You can get a hug and leave. Just come. So she got him in the gym. You felt the elephant in the room before it was even in the room, like before it even walked in. I just started with an icebreaker, which was give me two or three words on how you're feeling right now. Someone said upset. I said angry. Someone said sad. Sad.

We just went around. Somebody said their mom had to go fill up the gas pump, and they was crying because anybody could just pull up to a gas station and just rat-tat-tat-tat. Then I asked them to, like, go deeper with me. We started to talk, and Nakia, she asked us what happened. I ended up asking, like, a nine-year-old, do you know what's going on?

And she gave me the most blunt answer, which was, yeah, I know what's going on. A white man came and shot my people. I mostly talked half of the time because I had a lot of feelings. Christina is also a vet. Even though she is younger, she still has been with Bates the same amount of time that I have. But she's always been quiet. When we had the circle, how did that make you feel? I feel like...

Yes, somebody's finally talked to us. That shows us, yes, we will be fine. We will be okay. We are family here at base. I like the answer. I really do. Most of Chrissy's questions were questions at the time that I couldn't answer. Like, why us? Like, why here? I was telling her, like, he wanted to kill as many black people as he could. And she was just like, I still don't understand. Why don't they see what we see, which is a normal person? And...

It's been rough since then. I'm scared to go to school. Now schools are getting threats like, oh yeah, I'm coming up tomorrow and I'm doing this, this and this. It was thousands of cops last year at our school. I was like, mom, pick me up. I'm so scared. I don't want to walk in. She's like, sweetie, try not to think about it. Just have a regular day. I said, mom, regular day? What's a regular day for us? Be somebody who already blew up Tops.

They didn't directly express that they were afraid of being there, but they did say like, you know, we're so close. You know, I didn't want him to come here. It's only two blocks down from where it happened. That's the glass. You can see the trophies. You can see the locker. You can see who goes up to their locker. These tall windows, no tent. So you can see directly through. You can see almost kind of everything there.

I don't think those windows were bulletproof. I don't think they were. And from the back, you could just come in and just start shooting. Anyone could die. It could be a snap and you're dead. After the circle, that was pretty much everybody's last day and last hurrah in the cheer gym on Main Street. I see her walk up to me and she said, Coach Yanni, are we getting a different gym? Because I don't want to go back there.

And I'm like, no, what do you mean you don't want to go? And she said, it is not safe. I didn't see that gym again. No, I didn't go back. Stay tuned. If you were to go back to the gym on Main Street and to put your head to the glass, it's wiped clean. There's nothing there. You usually would look through the window. You would see thousands of trophies. You don't see that anymore. There was something lost here. That's how I feel when I go past it. If you really want to understand why Main Street was so important to us,

You have to understand the beginning before BASE was BASE. And you need to know the relationship between Auntie Yanni and the woman that she started BASE with. Her niece. Not me, but her actual niece.

So my daughter was cheering for a suburban gym and her children were cheering for a suburban gym. This is way before Yanni became a coach. And one day they were competing at the same facility and we looked at each other and bust out laughing. And we literally were like, dude, we're the Oreos. We're the only black people here. They were super close in age and they were always close friends.

So we just like laughed about it forever, like laughed. And then she said we should start our own cheer gym. And I'm like, girl, you're crazy as hell. You know how much money that's going to cost?

It seemed like every time that Yanni said no, Lanise just came back with a poke. Like, "Auntie, please, let's do it, let's do it." Like an agitating little sister. And I'm like, "Fine, we'll do it." We started in the community center. The rec center that had the kid handprints across the walls, that's where it all started. That was in June, June 25th, 2013. Exactly where I started my cheer career with BASE.

We didn't even have mats. Remember when we had the blue slippery mats? We didn't have no equipment. Oh my God, it was a hot mess. Weeks later, Coach Yanni ended up getting a call that Lanice had passed. Her friend called me screaming, and she's like, Lanice was just stabbed. She died. She was gone. They started with two people with a dream.

And then the two people with the drink became one person. I was like, "I gotta go. I can't do it." Like, "Yeah, I didn't want to do this anyways." But then the kids, the Milanes, the Kristinas, my kids, her kids were like, "You don't have a choice." The athletes jumped down her throat and was just like, "Yeah, like, open." We want to cheer. We want bass. Let's go.

Her passing was publicized on the news and it was tied to Buffalo All-Star Team. So it's kind of like everybody was already looking at us that we were the only Black team. And now they're looking at us as like the only Black team that has, like I'm going to say, trauma.

We had to compete in our first competition with t-shirts and shorts because our uniforms didn't come in on time. I still got mine, but mine is wrinkled and it's like the letters are coming off. Bro, I got some ugly blue shit. If you see any OGs like a Milani or me, they'll break down this story for you. I have the shorts, the bows, all that. I have every memory of Bates. Like, I have every single memory. All I need to hear you talk about that memory and that thing will pop back into my brain. I don't know nothing about Cher. You look crazy.

and we won first place. We didn't compete against heavy hitters, like real all-star teams, but we competed at the end of the day. That's what was important to us. I think it gave us a sense of, y'all are made for this. The big step for Bates was back in 2016 when we finally moved to Main Street and became an actual gym.

Five, six, seven, eight. One, three, five, seven, eight. One, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. We built everything in there. Like the OGs, we ended up putting on the spring floor. We painted the walls. We painted the base sign. When somebody says, oh, like I built my home from the ground up, that's how we built base. Oh, my God. It was the hardest thing to do, but it was the best. Yeah. We really made it.

We really made it like we don't have to roll the mats up and worry about like, OK, if we come in here, it might be like juice spilled on the floor. Like we have a gym. We really have a gym. You know, this is our this is our home. It just gave us that that sense of, yeah, girl, you made it. We had the Main Street gym for about six good years until May 14th, 2022. That was it. I didn't want to be there.

I even had to have people go get the stuff. Like, you have to move everything and put it in storage. I'm not going. I don't want to go. Like, blah. You made that split decision like, no, up and move. And my mom was like, yeah, like, this is really happening. And I'm like, we getting a new gym? She's like, yeah, we have to get a new gym. Auntie Yanni knew a warehouse that we could turn into our new home.

I was like, "There's no way we can afford it." We charge 50% less than what everyone else charges. Actually, more than 50% less. There's no way we can afford it. She went ahead and signed the lease anyway. But you can't just pick up a gym and open a new one in a week. It was a huge warehouse. Everything had to be renovated and knocked out, and the gym was not ready for us to move in. So we had to go back to square one, which was the rec center where B started.

We were in a community center. Again, like really? And I felt so bad. Like every day I was just like, I gotta get them out of here. Like how do we prepare all-star elite teams on a hardwood floor with two mats? I'm like, we need a home. Like we gotta go. The gym just wasn't ready. We couldn't get into it. So... No, no, no, no, no. Pee-wee's out there. After you've built something so powerful, just to go back to square one, I feel like we feel defeated.

We let somebody win. I felt like, you know what, somebody took something from me. I bust my ass for so long to give them this, and you took it from me. Well, it wasn't taken. I just felt like it was taken. Literally, they, he, it, whatever, took the feeling of being safe away. I went back to school in September. I was getting the calls of, the gym wasn't ready. And, you know, the girls still don't have choreography, right?

Then it's October again, the gym's still not open. At that point, I was like, should I fly home or something? What should I do? Because y'all acting like we don't have a season. Then I'm asking my mom, how's everybody with the mass shooting? How was everybody feeling with that? She was just like, I don't know. Nobody showed up today. Sometimes...

In our minds we forgot, not forgot, but it's just like, okay, like it's practice. Like, let's go, let's go, let's go. We're just expecting them to pick up and move on. And it's like, they're hurting. Like, okay, wow.

One of our dancers was at the shooting. If she hears a certain sound, like a loud boom, like if the door shuts, like they were in dance and the door like slam, boom. And she just screamed and no one else knew why. Of course, I'm looking at her like I know why. Can you imagine? And cheer your talk to no matter what happens behind, in front of you, you must smile at all times. And you must keep that preppy look of being happy and cheerful.

That high smile and the high eyes and, you know, might get a tongue stick or whatever. But you can't go out and put on a show if you're not confident in your mind. You can't act happy if you're not. I told my mom, when they go on that stage, pray over them as their mental matters. Pray over their well-being.

What we're looking at now is a bunch of cardboard, nails, screws. After five long months of not having a gym, at the very end of October, we finally were getting ready for our grand opening. We're calling it Big Bass. But the night before, Nancy Yanni was still scrambling around. Oh, we got a lot to do. Okay. Nothing was ready. Let me start working. Yanni and Daryl.

With a couple other chair moms, they were running around. - These trophies, I don't know where we gonna put 'em. We just gotta put 'em somewhere. - Get stuff hung up. - I wanna get rid of trophies. - Get stuff set up. - No, we're gonna be here all night. - That's definitely my aunt. She'll be like, "Oh, I have a brush in the car. "Let me just go brush my hair up real quick, "'cause I've been here all night." - No, honey, that right there,

It has to go up over there. Even though nothing was ready, Asayani was determined to get the gym open because my co-founder, it's her birthday. The opening day was also her niece's birthday. Our first grand opening of our old facility was on her birthday, so I'm just keeping our tradition. What is this? Oh my gosh. There's no instructions. Maybe I have it upside down probably. Oh boy, I just got depressed. I think I just got nervous. Hi. Hi.

This is Lonnie, a.k.a. Hamster. And sometimes, yeah, it's hard. And, yeah, you want to give up. And, yeah, you want to quit. And, yeah, you want to scream. And, yeah, you want to holler. And, yeah, we might have had a rough start. But we're getting stronger and stronger each and every practice.

Okay, hi guys. It's been a long time since we talked. So right now, well, I'm going to do my homework and I'm going to do this podcast. And then the exciting base opening, cut the ribbon with the big scissors and everything and the pizzazz. And we're going to have a new gym. It's going to be all worth it.

So basically, I'm going to get ready and you guys are going to get ready with me. This episode of Buffalo Extreme was reported by Mary Ann McCune with Nakia McCann. It was also produced by Mary Ann McCune and Dan Gurma with help from Abby Wendell. It was edited by Veralyn Williams and Katie Simon.

We had production support from Nick Nevis. Our team also includes Raina Cullen and Andrew Mambo. Our project manager is Lindsay McKenna. Josh Newell mixed the episode. Katie Simon is the supervising editor for Embedded. New episodes of Buffalo Extreme will be available every other week through mid-June on the Embedded podcast feed. The Sunday Story was produced by Ariana Garably with help from Justine Yan. I'm Rachel Martin. Up first, we'll be back tomorrow with all the news you need to start your week. Until then, have a great rest of your weekend.