SHS alum on team that wins national cheer competition

By Ben Olson
Reader Staff

Until this year, it had been more than a decade since Hawaii Pacific University participated in the National Cheerleaders Association national championship. However, the school’s cheer team returned to Dayton Beach, Fla. in a big way April 9, taking home a win for advanced small coed Division II. Among the ranks of that winning team was River Fueling, a Sandpoint High School graduate who began her training right here in North Idaho.

The SHS alum cheered for the Bulldogs for three years before graduating in 2019 and joining HPU’s squad her freshman year. 

River Fueling told the Reader it’s a tradition for the winning teams to jump into the ocean in their uniforms to celebrate with the trophy if they win. Courtesy photo.

“Now I’m a senior graduating and this is a great way to end four years,” Fueling told the Reader.

She said cheering in college took some getting used to after high school.

“Seeing the talent that’s here in school in Hawaii, it’s a whole different ball game than what you have in high school,” Fueling said. “They cheer with a whole different kind of energy here than they do on the mainland.”

While Fueling’s university boasted a legacy of winning national competitions for cheer, the program was cut in 2012.

“When I came in as a freshman, they were just trying to rebuild the program again,” she said. “Then, our first time back at nationals in 12 years, we won. It felt incredible. Everyone at the competition was welcoming us back, telling us they were so excited to see our program back on stage. Some alumni were there crying, telling us they thought they’d never see us compete again.”

Fueling’s position on the team is as a flier, which is one of the most notable because of the acrobatics that it requires. Combining skills from gymnastics, tumbling and dancing, cheer at the national level is both highly coordinated and creative — especially from teams like Fueling’s. Video from the competition shows the team’s winning routine as a coordinated, energetic dance in perfect sync, with tumbles, tosses and everything else under the sun coming together to a final crescendo.

“It takes a lot of trust to be a flier,” said Fueling. “You have to trust your bases to catch you. We’re judged on the way we perform, in the air and on the floor.”

Fueling said after her team placed third after Day 1 of the competition, they worked all day and night to make corrections to the routine.

“Then, we came back and performed Day 2 and made first place,” she said.

The NCA national competition is the biggest cheer competition in the country, made even more famous by popular shows such as Cheer on Netflix, which follows a winning team’s preparation for the annual event. 

“I am so proud of River’s dedication and training to her sport so that she could compete and win at the highest level of cheer competition in the nation,” said Andy Fueling, River’s dad, who lives in Sandpoint. “Her commitment and skills paid off with a National Championship win!”

“Cheer has come a long way from when it was first created,” River said. “A lot of people still think it’s just cheering on the sidelines and waving pom poms in the air, but honestly, cheer is one of the most insane sports. You have people flipping and balancing and landing on people’s hands in the air.”

Aside from being part of a nationally winning cheer team, Fueling is graduating this May from HPU as a political science major with a double emphasis in psychology and environmental science. She is also in final review of being the valedictorian of her class.

After they won the competition, Fueling and teammates took part in the tradition of running into the ocean with their cheer outfits and the national trophy.