K-State Cheer Coach Dani Ruoff’s positive ripples
By Tad Thompson
Damp eyes of Texas fans watched the Longhorns go down to K-State 17-13 on November 19, 2011. For the thirteenth-ranked K-State, it was the fourth straight football victory over vaunted Texas. Kansas State’s Dannielle “Dani” Ruoff, cheer squad coach, vividly recalls a subsequent conversation on her team’s bus.
It’s only in such private confines that Willie the Wildcat can be a regular college kid and speak without a Powercat head! As Dani relates the story years later, the gentleman even has a name. Adrian.
“Coach,” Adrian said, as he took a padded seat next to Dani, “Next year we’re going to play Texas at home, and we’re going to be in the Big 12 championship, and I claim that game.”
Dani notes, “We hadn’t even left the parking lot.” Not one to dampen enthusiasm, Dani was noncommittal.
But, after Adrian regained the Powercat head for 2012 season, he regularly reminded Coach Dani of the bus conversation, eventually adding he wanted to appear atop the press box.
The savvy coach weighed dark December possibilities with a heavily masked dancer on a high building’s edge.
Eventually, as Willie forecast twelve months earlier, a Longhorn defeat in Manhattan by seventh-ranked K-State would win Bill Snyder’s second Big 12 Championship.
Before a fiercely raucous December 1 purple crowd, the ‘Cats were up 21-17 over the 23rd-ranked Longhorns at the end of the third quarter. Dani didn’t want Willie’s grand appearance to be shattered, should a Longhorn comeback to ruin the night.
All conceivable doubt evaporated with 1:53 left in the fourth quarter when the beloved All-American quarterback Collin Klein bulled in from the nine-yard line for a touchdown. Anthony Cantele’s extra point put K-State up 42-17.
Dani gave Willie a nod toward the press box. “He was just shaking; he was so excited!”
In the dark were the yell leaders who hoisted Willie on K-State’s push-up board. As the 42nd point arched through the uprights, the men were astounded that Willie was nowhere in sight. “If you ever see the footage, there were some words there,” the coach notes. “They’re mad.”
Only three people in the stadium were aware of Willie’s destination. These were a woman in the press box, Willie and Dani.
Soon came the chilling, thrilling scene for all in frosty Bill Snyder Family Stadium, plus the national television audience. High atop the south end of the press box, Willie was vividly and very dramatically lit against a black winter sky.
“All of a sudden, the crowd just erupts” at the vision, Dani said. “K! S! U! WILDCATS! And then the fog started rolling in,” she recalls. An electrifying event forever remembered by all.
Manhattan Catbackers raised $3002 for the K-State Cheer team at the 2022 Catbackers Auction & Banquet.
What it means to be part of the K-State Cheer team
This passionate moment underscores the value of K-State’s entire cheer program, Dani said.
Sitting in row 39 at the south end of empty and quietly peaceful Bramlage Coliseum, she related her role as Manhattan Catbackers’ scribe on Aug. 17, 2022. She’d just dismissed her 43-person squad after 45 Manhattan Catbackers hosted them for a potluck dinner in Bramlage’s west foyer. The dismissal came as the students cheerfully completed helping their supporters clean up after dinner.
This Catbackers group hosts the cheer squad each year as part of their support for the bright, fun young people and Dani, who is entering her 15th season at K-State. She arrived in August 2008 after coaching at Montana State.
The Manhattan Catbackers purpose is to support all students involved in K-State Athletics, including the cheer squad and the Kansas State Marching Band. These students receive no compensation from the university despite working countless hours to add thrilling talent to complete the joyful experience of attending Kansas State athletic events. Dani indicated that junior colleges in America often give scholarships to cheer squads. But it virtually never occurs at four-year schools.
“As K-State, we are in a very good position as far as the cheer team. Gene Taylor has been very supportive of us, and we’re very fortunate to have Gene Taylor at K-State.”
The cheer coach adds, “We’ve got an incredible fan base here. You know, Manhattan Catbackers, they’re a big part of our fan base, and we just have outstanding support.”
The cheer squad greatly appreciates Catbacker support, she stressed.
Dani would “love to get these guys scholarships. Now, we have some small scholarships that we provide through the athletic department with different things that we do. It’s a few hundred dollars here and there. Many have very good GPAs, where they can get other assistance through different programs. There are so many ways to get different scholarships.
“But you know the cost of education. I would like to help these individuals with their education.”
The overall experience of coaching K-State cheer “is just really cool. We make people smile. I’ve got so many memories, and I’m so blessed. I’ve seen so many things. I really should write a book.”
“But I would love the gentlemen who’ve been Willie in the past, when they graduate, to write a book about what they see from within the head because they see some incredible things. “One example, we were asked to go to a hospice. There was a 55-year-old Down Syndrome gentleman, and his dying wish was to meet Willie Wildcat. We were able to make it work.”
After the visit, when he got home and was free to talk, Willie “called me and shared, ‘I understand why I do what I do.’”
It’s not always easy to stay on the sidelines, Dani explains. “One of my first years here, we played KU at home, and I always begged for forgiveness. One example, Willie wasn’t supposed to go onto the football field after the game.” But after an overwhelming win, he did so. “He stood in the middle of the Powercat and did the ‘KSU’ cheer.” Wildcat fans thunderously roared. “It was so loud that the security reported the vibration from the crowd’s cheering made alarms go off in some of the cars in the parking lot.”
Generally speaking, “There are so many cool things. It’s just so awesome! I have team members, but when they’re done, I consider them very good friends. It’s cool when you have a former yell leader who called me up a couple of years ago and said, ‘Coach, my wife just went into labor.’ And I say, ‘Well, you need to get off the phone and get your wife to the hospital!’
“I’ve got some incredible individuals from all my years of cheerleading.” Among them are “big-time attorneys and higher-ups, like at Philips 66. I have individuals that are incredible architects in Chicago. It’s really cool when those individuals call me up and say, ‘Hey, thanks, Coach,’ because I taught some of my time management skills with what we were doing. And communication and how important that everything we do is done with the family aspect. What we do here is fun and what we do on the field is very important to me; and I want everyone to look good, but I want them to be good people as well and provide (for society) when they’re away from the basketball court or the football field.”
K-State Cheer: How it works
This year the cheer squad numbers 43. There are 11 gentlemen, down from a dozen, because one was a soldier who is deployed. “We wish him the best and hope he stays safe.”
The entire squad participates in home football games, but there are limits to how many can be on the field. So, the different subsets circulate through the length of games. With so many home men’s and women's basketball games, there are groups of about 11 than rotate.
Dani sits in front of the band at every game and records fastidious notes on each performance. “They all make fun of me because I keep my notes, and I document everything.”
The KU basketball game is the plum home assignment for the cheer squad. So, from November’s basketball tip-off, team grades are tallied, with the top team earning the floor for the Jayhawks. Additionally, between six and eight cheer members appear at each volleyball game.
Of course, with the K-State Marching Band, the entire cheer squad shows enthusiasm when the football team walks its traditional entry into BSFS. The members have many other appearances, as well.
Coach Dani: A Montana native
Dani grew up in Shepherd, Montana, and remains close to her parents. She coached at “Montana State-Billings for a few years, and then I went to the big university, Montana State-Bozeman, before I came here.”
When she first learned of the K-State coaching position, “The first thing I said was: ‘I’m not going anywhere with tornados,’ not knowing very much about Kansas at all.” Now her father gives her Montana temperature reports, and Kansas’ weather seems very good.
“I cheered in junior high and high school, and my mom was also a cheerleader when she was in high school.” Through four years of high school, “I had the great opportunity to work with a cheer company in Hawaii, and I would go and work with them at different times. I got to cheer at some big bowl games, including the Hula Bowl, and I did coach a high school team at the Down Under Bowl in Australia for three years. I got to do some things that I didn’t do in Montana, and I got to do some things that were more on the athletic side that I didn’t see in the small school.”
While training in Hawaii, “I just got hooked and saw an excellent opportunity to continue to cheer and learn some cool things. There is a very, very long story with this.”
Dani played volleyball and basketball growing up, but track and cheerleading became her focus as she got older. I did the mile, two-mile, and two-mile relay. But cheerleading was something that just stuck with me, and when I saw what it could provide for others, that stuck with me.
“I feel it gives individuals the chance to give to others and make others happy. But it also gives confidence. In coaching, there is much more than teaching how to do cheers, stunts, tumbling, and everything. I am also teaching them time management, and I’m teaching them communication skills. And hopefully, when they get out in the real world, then they can use what they did in cheerleading to go out and help others.”