We are very proud of our Newman Warriors for representing us well and winning the State Cheer Competition!
Photo Credit: Shafkat Anowar
Please check out the article about our team in the Dallas Morning News: https://www.dallasnews.com/high-school-sports/football/2025/01/27/a-texas-football-coach-took-over-a-cheerleading-squad-then-they-won-a-state-championship/
A Texas football coach took over a cheerleading squad. Then they won a state championship
David Green went from the football field to the cheer circuit with Newman International Academy in Arlington.
By Myah Taylor
Staff Reporter
Jan. 27, 2025
ARLINGTON — David Green’s world involves playbooks and pads, not pompoms and pyramids.
But that all changed for the football coach and athletic director at Newman International Academy Gibbins campus in Arlington who found himself thrust into a new role just before Christmas.
When Green couldn’t find a replacement for the charter school’s cheer coach, who had to resign just weeks before the cheer state championship because of pregnancy complications, he did what he could to save their season.
“The last resort was their football coach was going to be a cheer coach,” said Green, who is in his second year at the school.
Green put the 21 girls and five football players he recruited from his team through “football” style practices, including two-a-days. Unfamiliar with modern cheer terminology and technique, Green did a lot of learning on the spot. He had help from assistants, one of whom had cheer experience, and guidance from the squad.
With only four weeks of practice to prepare, Green and the team weren’t sure what to expect heading into the Jan. 18 Texas Charter School Academic & Athletic League cheer state championship.
At the end of the competition, the judges awarded Newman the state title, bringing Green to tears.
“I get emotional, especially when you see something moving forward,” he said. “I got to see the excitement in their eyes and that’s what I needed.”
But the students didn’t necessarily feel excited when Green took over the program.
“It was definitely shocking at first when we had our first meeting with him to see him walk in since he’s known as the football coach. … I was definitely skeptical,” senior Hannah Kambeu said. “After our first practice, he showed that he wasn’t here to just have us figure it out and that he was going to help us actually figure out our routine.”
Kambeu commended the football players for their willingness to learn. The boys, who mostly helped with stunts, agreed to step out of their comfort zone when Green invited them to join.
“It was definitely an experience, something new. Something that we’re not born into. Nothing of our nature,” junior Damarion Anderson said. “So we had a lot of new things taught to us. Hopefully we can carry them over into next year.”
The format of the practices wasn’t foreign to the football players. Green used his whistle — a sound the girls had never heard at cheer practice — and ran drills during their rehearsal time. He wanted to make sure no one stood around, just like at football practice, so if one group was learning a new component, another group did reps of the routine.
Students said Green took on the perspective of a judge, making sure the routine was clean.
“Even if he didn’t remember the counts exactly, you could always count on him [to say], ‘Attitude, ladies’ or ‘Smile, maybe add a little wink in. The judges like that,’” freshman Jaylah Smith said.
Green, who was a firefighter for 25 years before becoming a coach, said his friends teased him in good fun after the team won state. They sent him memes of the Saturday Night Live Spartan cheerleaders skit.
Taking on the job seemed crazy, Green admits, but his daughter, who works in theater, inspired him to go for it.
“‘Dad, here’s the thing you need to remember,’” he recalled her telling him. “‘ Do you know how you feel when you get ready for a Friday night football game? … Those cheerleaders have that same feeling, You get 10 games. They get one.’”
“That stuck with me,” Green said.
The experience of continuing the season and winning state resonated with the students, too.
“We were about to opt out from competition entirely, and then Coach Green came and reeled us back in,” junior Madeline Cao said. “Most of us didn’t even believe that we could win, so when the announcement came that we won first, I felt like at that moment, I felt so much pride at my school and so much spirit.”
Videos of competition routine and victory celebration: