The Los Osos High School Dance Team has risen to fame after their viral piece recreating Rihanna and the halftime performance at the Super Bowl. The team was viewed almost 19.6 million times on their TikTok account: @lohsvarsitydance.
All of the team’s amazing pieces were choreographed by the dance director and former student, Rachel Muego. Most of their dances are performed by their Varsity and Junior Varsity teams. They are headed by Varsity Captains, Senior Mia Castillo, Senior Carlie Mason, and Senior Makalah Scott. As well as Junior Varsity Captains, Senior Karina Calie, Senior Natalia Mitchell, and Senior Alexa Murray.
Dance director, Rachel Muego said that her inspiration from her dances “comes from almost anything: new trends, music, fashion, popular artists, movies, etc. Sometimes I’ll have an idea ready and other times we will brainstorm as a team.”
Other than Rihanna, the team has recreated dances inspired by Bad Bunny, Barbie, Cardi B’s Bongos, Usher, and Carnival.
The team now has over 146.4K followers on TikTok and 13.1K followers on Instagram.
From these amazing dance recreations, Bad Bunny, Cardi B, and Usher have recognized their work. Bad Bunny and Cardi B both reposted their dances to their personal social media accounts. Usher commented on their dance saying “Y’all didn’t come to play games.”
The dance team was featured on a New York Times Billboard in July 2023. The team performed alongside CJUHSD’s dance teams at Disneyland. In January 2024, the team was featured on Good Morning America for their Usher performance. CNN, iHeartRadio, and KTLA 5 all recognized the amazing work that the team puts in to make the school united in spirit.
However, the team announced an incredible opportunity that they were given at their Spring Show. They were given the chance to audition for America’s Got Talent (AGT)! Muego said that AGT had reached out to her after the Rhinanna dance went viral.
“I felt honored, but a little scared because we’ve never completed or done anything like this before,” she said.
While dancers typically only perform for about two minutes, there were a lot of rehearsals that were behind the scenes to make sure that the team had perfected their routine.
Depending on how soon the performances are, Muego schedules rehearsals to teach her choreography, create formations, and “piece it all together like a puzzle.”
Other than the dancers, Muego has the biggest task of brainstorming and figuring out the music. This is a big part of the performance and integral to making the dances come to life.
The opportunity to perform at AGT is one that not many people get, especially in high school. However, the dancers expressed extreme gratitude to be given the experience.
“Performing at AGT was the most overwhelming but exciting thing I’ve ever done. The amount of love we received from our friends, family, and student body was everything the team could have asked for. We had worked so hard for that moment and it was truly worth it,” said Junior Kendall Clark who is on the Junior Varsity Dance Team.
The feeling that performing gives you is truly different.
“Performing at AGT was such a surreal experience. Never in my life would I have ever expected to be on the show, and getting to perform in front of the judges that we all see on TV was a feeling that is so indescribable” said Senior Lindsey Krugar, who is on the Varsity Dance Team.
The team had to keep this amazing experience a secret since they wanted to share it with friends and family rather than sharing on social media.
“Keeping AGT a secret was SO hard because it’s such an amazing opportunity for us and we wanted to share the excitement that we had with the school!” said Junior Olivia Raymond.
With AGT being a secret from the community, “it was fun to share it with just our team and work on it just as a team, it was just our thing,” said Freshman Haylee Peterson.
Muego was a student at Los Osos before she became the dance instructor.
“Osos will always be home to me. A big reason why we get to be creative and expressive with dance is because we’ve been given a safe space where we feel supported by staff, parents, and students. I’ve felt an overwhelming amount of support as both an alumni and teacher,” Muego said.
Since there are so many rehearsals, the team has grown into a big family that Muego has fostered.
Senior Francess Guido, said, “My favorite part of being on the team is the overall family-oriented environment that Rachel has given us. [She] has always made our team connection our number one priority and being able to have a place that feels like home on campus is something that has made my overall high school experience such a great one. We all love to dance and that’s what we do! We want to share our passion for it and spread school spirit school-wide and throughout our community.”
The team has become many of the dancers’ second family.
Junior Jennie Ricotta, said, “My favorite part about being on the team is the bond we all have together. We all work together really well and we’re all close, I see them as my second family!”
The seniors expressed their gratitude for the dance program that helped make their high school experience unique.
“As a senior, I’ve seen this department grow since Ms. Rachel was first introduced as our teacher, so that has been very special to see. The opportunities she has been able to provide for us such as incredible dances that we have been so blessed to see go viral, the opportunity to perform in the Disneyland holiday parade, amazing shows, and so much more have been incredible and I am so grateful for this opportunity. But my favorite memory from dance would definitely have to be the whole AGT process as this allowed our team to grow so close so fast as we would be at practice for hours and hours after school and the weekends, and just being able to experience this once in a lifetime opportunity with the people I love most has been my favorite thing and truly made my high school experience like no other,” said Senior Lindsey Krueger.
Dance has shown the students on the dance team how important hard work is.
“As a senior, it has been the biggest blessing to be on this team for the past 4 years. I’ve never seen a team that works as hard as we do, so I would have to say my favorite moment about being on dance was right after we finished performing at AGT and having that feeling of accomplishment and being surrounded by the people I love most. It showed that hard work pays off and there is no other team I would want to experience that moment with,” said Senior Karsyn Harlow.
Muego expressed the special aspects of dance and the connections that you can form throughout the sport.
She said, “Dance is special because it’s something so personal and vulnerable yet can be shared between each other and our audience. It puts us in a good mood and always brings us together. Paired with a lot of weird jokes and sharing food, the dance team is truly a big family!”