As homecoming weekend approached, Shippensburg University’s homecoming committee planned and held several events to prepare and excite students.

On Thursday evening at Memorial Auditorium, a lip sync competition was held. SU students were able to register to perform solo or with a group. The idea of lip syncing is to mouth the words of a song and make it look as realistic as possible. The auditorium seats flooded with students around 9 p.m.

As students entered Memorial Auditorium, they handed in $1 for a raffle ticket for admission.

The dollar paid was also a donation toward the Cumberland Valley Animal Shelter (CVAS).

For an extra dollar, students could also get a bracelet from the shelter.

“You guys are a class act from the bottom of my heart and the bottom of all the four-legged hearts at the shelter,” Jennifer Vanderau, CVAS communications director, told the audience.

The performances began after host Tom Fizzano introduced the first act, Amanda Partner. After performers lip synced their songs, the eight judges gave feedback. Judges of the competition consisted of prominent people of SU’s campus such as Samuel Frushour, the assistant director for campus activities and programming, as well as Alexandira Maurizzio, resident director of Kieffer Hall.

The second act was a group called “Baywatch.” Members of the rugby team lip synced to the song “Kokomo” by The Beach Boys while dancing in sync, wearing Hawaiian attire.

Throughout the night, Fizzano picked tickets out of a bucket and gave away gift cards to the winners. The gift cards were to local places such as Wal-Mart, Chick-fil-A, Dunkin’ Donuts, Starbucks, Taco Bell and even Stubhub.

The winner of last year’s lip sync competition, James Bailey, was the third act of the night. He danced and sang along to the song “It’s Raining Men” while rain was falling down in the backdrop behind him and the crowd clapped along.

After raffling another gift card, Fizzano searched for two people in the crowd to come up and sing on stage.

In his search, Troy Bolton and Gabriela Montez came up to the stage and sang “Start of Something New” from “High School Musical.” This performance was done by Grant Henry and Jake Murray.

“There have been a lot of very good performances tonight,” junior Cody Olson said.

Multicultural Student Affairs (MSA) members, of Heritage Dance Company, sang and danced along to “California Girls” by Katy Perry. They wore red tank tops to give a beach vibe and had mini palm trees on stage.

During their performance, members moved into the crowd and danced up and down the aisles while throwing around beach balls.

They were the first-place winners out of the large groups who performed.

In second place was the Tech Crew and tied for third was In-Motion Dance Troupe and Act IV.

The Tech Crew dressed up as the band Queen and had its own three back up sharks dancing along. People in the crowd raised glow sticks in sync with the music.

Act IV dressed up as the cast from “The Little Mermaid” and sang along to “Cake by the Ocean.”

The final performance was the In-Motion Dance Troupe which dressed up as the cast of “Shrek” and sang the famous song from the movie, “I’m A Believer.”

The solo winner was the returning champion, James Bailey.

In second for the smaller groups was Troy and Gabriella’s duet. In third place was Amanda Partner.

The winners of the competition won cash prizes.

Share