A group of Tiger student section members lit up social media earlier this week when juniors Jacob Leisinger, Trevor Benson, Noah Hermansen and Denison Harrington dropped a rap song in honor of the CFHS women’s basketball team qualifying for State. Inspired by the class of 2013 seniors who created a song when their men’s team attended State, this newly formed rap collective released the track titled “CF Anthem Part 2: Girls Basketball Edition.”
The girls fought valiantly on Wednesday at Wells Fargo in Des Moines, hanging with No. 2-ranked Waukee the entire game. Although the rap was not enough to propel the team toward the win, it was certainly a factor in the hype of the student section at the Well.
Initially dropped on Sunday night from Leisinger’s Twitter account, @jleisinger35, the song immediately blew up and continued to gain hype as it was then tweeted by the Tiger student section Twitter account, @TIGERNATION12.
According to starting shooting guard senior Jamie Becker, head coach Gregg Groen was told by the Waukee head coach that his team had been playing the anthem in their gym all week because they genuinely liked the song. “We literally heard them singing it when we were both by the locker rooms warming up,” Becker said.
The track opens with Leisinger, otherwise known as J Leis, spitting bar after bar of clever lyrics with an obvious understanding of lyrical construction and flow. With his recognizable voice and swagger, Leisinger incorporates the names of the girls on the team and head coach Groen in his rhymes. Quickly going viral throughout the community, Leisinger’s mother and teacher in the Waterloo school district, Molly Leisinger, has even been reported to have been referred to as “M Leis” by her coworkers.
“I just loved spending time thinking about it and trying to put something good out there for the high school to listen to. I appreciated what the girls did, and it’s a great time to go to State, so we just wanted to make it a little more special for them,” Leisinger said.
Following up Leisinger’s hot verse with some rhymes of his own is Benson, otherwise known as TRBulence. Keeping the energy going over the beat used from 2006 single “It’s Goin’ Down” by Yung Joc, Benson promotes the student section and includes a shoutout to athletic director Gary Koenen.
“The shoutouts were fun. [It was difficult] to think of lines that were creative and went along with the theme of the women’s basketball team for that long of a time,” Benson said, commenting on the formidable track length of 3 minutes and 45 seconds.
Coming in for a third verse is Hermansen, otherwise known as Jiggy Sheets, incorporating a series of food-analogies and interesting tempo shifts. “It was very fun. It was just with my boys — my goons,” Hermansen said.
Wrapping up the track with confidence is Harrington, otherwise known as Baby D, otherwise known as the man with the 11:30 curfew. With a steady flow, Harrington offers tons of support for Tiger Nation.
“I wasn’t really originally supposed to be in there, but I came in straight off the streets with my bars, you know? I just wrote a few down and used the ones that I liked. For me it wasn’t really that hard, and I’m not throwin’ anyone under the bus because we need to be professional, but I’m just saying that some struggled more than I did,” Harrington said.
The track concludes with a series of shoutouts, including one to the group’s studio manager and producer, sophomore Josh Post. The rap collective assembled in Post’s bedroom where the track was recorded and produced.
“It was great because they had a lot of energy, and we could really build some chemistry in the studio and get it done. It was just about having fun and making a good track,” Post said.
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