After cheering at Western Kentucky University, joining the Air Force and then retiring, Trisha Mancini ended up in Rapid City, South Dakota. With her strong cheerleading background she knew she would be a perfect fit as a cheerleading coach, but what she didn’t realize was she was going to have to start from the ground up.

Cheerleading in the western part of South Dakota isn’t as popular as the other parts of the country, and Central High School needed someone to come in and develop the cheerleading program. Trisha made it her mission to help build up cheerleading in South Dakota. She knew it was going to be a lot of hard work, but she was up for the challenge.

Brittany Minton, assistant coach, says “Trisha has managed to build up the squads to be highly competitive. Before she got involved at Central High School, the squads didn’t know how to stunt and now they are putting up scorpions with the best of them. She is truly an inspiration to us, and an amazing leader.”

Trisha has clearly achieved her goal, and has brought a much needed breath of fresh air to cheerleading in South Dakota. When she’s not coaching the cheerleaders from Central, she’s also coaching the Ultimate Cheer All Stars, which is the only all star gym for 200 miles.

UCA wants to thank Trish for loving cheerleading as much as we do and for taking the time and energy to build up the cheerleading program in an area that needed some attention!