Ilona Maher Reveals Excitement for ‘DWTS’ Semifinals in Comical Dance Routine With Alan Bersten

The pro rugby player is quite literally jumping for joy ahead of their Nov. 19 performance.

Ilona Maher / Disney/Getty Images

Ilona Maher is—quite literally—jumping for joy ahead of the semifinals of Dancing With the Stars. The professional rugby player has been competing on Season 33 of the reality television show nearly every week since early September and has managed to make it all the way to the penultimate performance.

Understandably, Maher (who is not a professional dancer by trade) is psyched to have made it to the semifinals alongside her professional dance partner Alan Bersten. As has been the case all season, the Paris Olympics bronze medalist proved as much with a behind the scenes look into the Dancing With the Stars practice studio.

Though we’re sure the pair spend the majority of their time in the studio honing their dance routines, it’s not all business for Maher and Bersten. In a video that the pro athlete shared to her Instagram over the weekend, the pair playfully danced (and jumped around) to the sound of “Roses” by Jenna Raine. According to Maher, the comical routine served as the perfect way to encapsulate their excitement ahead of the semifinals.

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But she also used the post as an opportunity to thank her fans for supporting them in their endeavor—and ask that they continue to do so. “Thank you to all of you! please keep supporting,” she wrote in the caption of her post.

Tomorrow, Nov. 19, the pair will perform two different dances, hoping to earn enough viewer votes and high enough performance scores to advance to the last episode. The Tuesday installment of the show will feature a Ballroom dance round and a Latin dance round. Maher and Bersten are set to perform a Viennese Waltz (for the Ballroom round) to the sound of “golden hour” by JVKE and a Paso Doble (for the Latin round) to “Unholy (Orchestral Version)” by Sam Smith and Kim Petras.

Both are sure to be very different from the playful performance that Maher and Bersten put on for her latest Instagram. But, like their performances (on stage and in the practice studio) have been all season, we’re sure that tomorrow’s choreographed numbers will be much as exciting and entertaining. The pair are, after all, coming off of their first 10 of the season, which they earned for their Quickstep during last week’s 500th episode. In other words, they’re riding a high, and we’re sure that will be apparent on the stage tomorrow.