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Westminster students go viral on TikTok after dancing video

Westminster College students Brandon Warr, Brandon Willardson and Daniel Quesenberry became ‘TikTok famous’ seemingly overnight after posting choreographed dances to the social media platform.

The trio has played basketball together for two years on the men’s team at Westminster and have taken their friendship and team dynamic off the court and onto TikTok.

“We were just hanging out one night and coming up with things to do because that’s usually how it goes when you’re hanging out with the boys,” said Warr, a junior majoring in business finance.

That night in a family member’s basement, the three started remaking a trending video with Quesenberry’s wife, Nicole, so that they could nail the choreography with the help of her dance experience and critiquing.

“She came up with the idea and was like, ‘Hey let’s make a TikTok!’,” Warr said. “Dan and B and I were just like, ‘Yeah, let’s do it, let’s have some fun with it.’”

That first video was posted on Warr’s account March 16 and has since received more than 3 million likes and 20 thousand comments.

“We posted it and it just started going by thousands,” Warr said. “I think before we went to bed it was like 7,000 likes within 3 or 4 hours […] and then we woke up in the morning and it was around like 200 thousand views. By the end, it was like a million [views] within less than 24 hours.”

The trio has made three videos thus far — bringing in millions of views together and more than 200 thousand followers, as thousands more follow the account every day.

As the trend has gone viral, the rising TikTokers said it has been exciting to see celebrities such as singer Jason Derulo and YouTuber David Dobrik participate in a trend they were also a part of.

“It was kind of cool that, regardless if they were watching our exact video or not, it was kind of cool to think that they were doing the moves that we brought to that dance,” said Quesenberry, a senior majoring in biology.

As their video has gained traction, the group has also been featured on popular meme accounts and media sites including ITB Worldwide.

ITB Worldwide markets for popular entertainment by ‘loving’ content creators on their page. On April 7, ITB Worldwide ‘loved’ Brandon Warr, sharing him on their Instagram story saying, “Keep the videos coming!”

As for life after the video went viral, Willardson, a junior majoring in public health, said that it’s “weird” because a lot of people in his town have heard about the video and only want to talk about that.

“It’s weird to see how many people have seen it,” Willardson said. “I don’t know, we’re just three random, poor college kids that came up with a dance one night.”

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Shaylie Johnson is a junior majoring in communication and minoring in business. She followed the Utah stereotype by getting married young but is determined not to drop out of college to have 6,000 children. Instead, she is a crazy plant lady who is often found at rock concerts or eating whole lasagnas. One day, you'll see her name again as a writer -- who knows what it will be for, but it'll be big.

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