From ‘Making the Team’ to ‘America’s Sweethearts’: How Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders Become Reality Stars (2024)

Every reality show promises some reward. Often these are explicit—a million dollars, a proposal, arecurring role on hit teen dramaGlee—but even those without a formal prize offer a steady paycheck, and attention, which can be even more valuable to the aspiring star. For sixteen seasons, the CMT showDallas Cowboys Cheerleaders: Making the Team did both. Though it was canceled in 2022, a new Netflix docuseries,America’s Sweethearts, picks up the megaphone on June 20 and promises an even bigger audience for the women vying for pairs ofblue and silver pom-poms.

The show certainly checks two of the most important reality TV boxes: it’s got attractive people and cutthroat competition. “You need to look like a supermodel but perform like an athlete,” a woman says in a promo.

But will it be the reality-star maker the original was?Making the Teamdepicted the DCC program’s annual auditions and training camp. Dancers from all over the country descended upon Arlington to win a spot on themost famous cheer team in the NFL. Hundreds showed up at the initial open audition, and if they could survive three rounds of auditions, a brutal “judges’ showcase,” a grueling months-long training camp, interviews, costume fittings, and BMI testing, and could successfully demonstrate a knowledge of football rules and the history of the Dallas Cowboys, they could be one of the lucky 36 to make the team.

Because the cameras were around from the start of the audition process, even contestants who didn’t ultimately make the team got a lot of screen time, endearing them to the show’s avid fan base. You could be a star without being a cheerleader, though that didn’t translate to much success outside the show when it first started airing. But once social media became its own ecosystem, a prospective “America’s Sweetheart” could “lose” atMaking the Teamand walk away with a career as an influencer, possibly earning a lot more than the $500 per game DC cheerleaders reportedly make.

Several former contestants and cheerleaders high-kicked themselves onto other reality shows over the years. Focused asMaking the Teammay be on the prize of a spot on the squad, it has also undoubtedly served as the opening number in a career on the reality TV circuit. With Netflix’sAmerica’s Sweethearts, there will be a new path from AT&T Stadium to The Bachelor—or one of the streaming platform’s own reality shows. Who wouldn’t want to see a former Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader onThe Circle,Is It Cake?, Squid Game: The Challenge, or Too Hot to Handle?

TheMaking the Teamalums below could give the new crop of cheerleaders a few pointers on how to make the leap.

Jasmine Goodemade the team during season seven, in 2013. She stuck around for a few years but was famously cut before training camp in season ten. She then tried (and failed, thank God) to fall in love with Nick Viall during the twenty-first season ofThe Bachelor and was able to parlay that into a spot on the franchise’s bawdier spin-off,Bachelor in Paradise. In 2024 she appeared in another spin-off,The Valley, as a friend of the shameless (and perfect for reality TV) Jax Taylor and Kristen Doute, two disgraced former cast members of the Bravo showVanderpump Rules. It was a hit and has already been renewed for a second season.

Melissa Rycroft preceded Goode in the Arlington-to-Bachelor pipeline. She became a Cowboys cheerleader in 2006, making several appearances on the show. After she left the squad in 2008, she went on to compete for Bachelor Jason Mesnik’s final rose and found herself in one of the most iconic moments in the franchise’s history. She “won” a proposal on the finale, only for Mesnik to quickly leave her for the runner-up. Post-jilting, Rycroft competed in three separate seasons of Dancing with the Stars (in 2009, 2012, and 2018) and briefly had her own reality show on CMT in 2012, Melissa & Tye, which documented her marriage to insurance agent Tye Strickland. She came back as a judge in the ninth season of Making the Team and in 2016 hosted one episode of a CMT competition show called Redneck Island.

Twins Emily and Haley Ferguson auditioned for the DCC in season eight. Though they never made it to training camp, they cheered their way into Bachelor Nation. The two competed against each other for Ben Higgins’s affections (gross) in 2016 and afterward joined the third and fourth seasons of Bachelor in Paradise (only Haley came back in season six). They scored one season of their own reality show, The Twins: Happily Ever After?, on Freeform in 2017. In 2021 they started a Bachelor commentary podcast called Twinning at Life, which ran for under a year.

Brandi Redmond’s appearance on DCC: Making the Team was brief; she only appeared during the original two-hour pilot, but it was enough of a spotlight for Bravo to hire her for The Real Housewives of Dallas, which ran from 2016 to 2021.

Emily “Starr” Spangler only appeared in seasons one and two, but she would later go on to win season thirteen of The Amazing Race, splitting a $1 million prize with her brother Nick in 2008.

Kathryn Dunn was cut from training camp in seasons three and eight of Making the Team. She later moved into the Big Brother house in 2019. She ended in tenth place.

Screen time on Making the Team is not necessarily a prerequisite for a successful reality TV future. Just being a Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader can be enough, as evidenced by the post-DCC career of Jenni Croft, who made it through eight weeks of rose ceremonies before being cut by The Bachelor’s Brad Womack in 2007.

Former DCC Kristin Holt proved that star power on the field does not necessarily translate to the stage. She competed in the premiere season of American Idol, in 2002, but was eliminated by viewers in the first round of voting, clearing the way for another Metroplex native, Kelly Clarkson, to take the crown.