Cummings High School’s marching band left early Wednesday morning, headed to New Orleans to perform at the Sugar Bowl on Saturday. Numerous community members and families braved below-freezing temperatures to see the students off.
The marching band from Cummings is the only one from a North Carolina school that has been invited to perform at the Sugar Bowl. The community helped the school and band boosters raise more than $90,000 for the trip.
The marching band, which includes 49 students from both Broadview Middle and Cummings High schools, was expected to arrive in New Orleans later Wednesday in order to practice with other bands and prepare for a parade before performing at halftime Saturday, according to Les Atkins, the public information officer for the Alamance-Burlington school system.
“Alamance County is full of champions that rose to the occasion by ensuring the Cummings High School marching band students would have enough funding to attend the Sugar Bowl,” the marching band’s director Greg Milton recently told The Alamance News. “It was not easy but there is nothing too hard for champions. Thank you for all the champions [who] gave.”
The 89th annual Sugar Bowl will feature Kansas State from the Big 12 Conference and Alabama from the Southeastern Conference (SEC). The game is scheduled to begin at 11:00 a.m. Central Standard Time and will air on ESPN, according to the game’s sponsor.