By CONNIE NOLEN / Community Columnist

“The seniors are a good class, but the junior class is just better,” said Will Pierce. “Yep, I’d say the juniors are for sure gonna win the spirit stick.”

This statement was attributed to Pierce days before Pelham High School’s first 2016 pep rally by a very reliable source and corroborated by Pelham High School junior Will Pierce himself immediately following the first pep rally of the year where the juniors did, in fact, win the spirit stick.

While all Pelham Panthers cheer for their athletic, performance and academic teams, there is a healthy rivalry that exists between the graduating classes for the spirit stick and all other class competitions.

Classes use group messaging and social media to spread the word about activities to show, not only their personal spirit, but also their spirit as a class.

The seniors arrived for the pep rally dressed in all black today and white permeated the junior class section.

The seniors also had a large senior sign hanging from the railing above their section and the juniors had an energetic young many holding up a canvas that said “Juniors Class of ’18.”

Cheering competitions between classes were fierce; however, in the end, the juniors walked away with the spirit stick today.

While sophomores and freshman sit together as classes also, their sections are in the balcony—and the great distance to the gym floor removes them somewhat from the fray—and the intense spirit rivalry.

As football season continues, the graduating classes of PHS will continue to work hard to outdo one another to capture the coveted spirit stick.

However, immediately after the awarding of the spirit stick, the best PHS tradition of all takes place. All of the students on the gym floor level—juniors and seniors combined—come together.

As the band plays the alma mater, the students lock arms, sing their school song and realize that we are all one team unified by this school and this city.

We are Pelham, and—in the end—Pelham always stands strong together.