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Competition at the Sunnydale High cheerleading tryouts literally heats up when the star cheerleader catches on fire during her routine. As if the pressure of the tryouts isn't enough, Amy Madison (Elizabeth Anne Allen) is failing miserably to get on the team and live up to her mother Catherine's (Robin Riker) legacy as the cheerleading champion of Sunnydale High. Buffy (Sarah Michelle Gellar) also wants to get on the team, but she and Amy end up first and third alternates, respectively. Then, serendipitously, Cordelia (Charisma Carpenter) becomes blind, another cheerleader's mouth is sealed with a flap of skin, and Buffy is turned into a dangerously peppy pom-pom girl through a Bloodstone Vengeance spell. It's no surprise when Amy makes the team. Buffy, weakened by the spell, goes with Giles (Anthony Stewart Head) to Amy's house, only to find that it is Amy's mother, Catherine, a witch who has inhabited her daughter's body, who is casting the spells. This leads to a showdown with the witch at the high school, in which Giles reverses all of her spells. In a final twist, Buffy repels Catherine's final spell, trapping her in the cheerleading trophy she won as a teenager. Originally aired on March 17, 1996, "The Witch" was the first episode in the series not to deal directly with vampires. Also, Buffy's cheerleading interest is the first direct reference to Buffy the Vampire Slayer the movie, in which she was a pom-pom queen.