Fleming to lead Ringgold cheerleaders

Ringgold High School football coach and athletic director Robert Akins said the Tigers have scored a touchdown Tami Fleming.

Fleming, wife of Ringgold assistant football coach Chase Fleming, is taking over as the school’s competition cheerleading team, football and basketball squads.

Akins said this is another positive step for a program rich in cheerleading tradition.

“We’re very excited to have her on our staff and know that she will do an excellent job as an English teacher and coach,” he said.

Fleming has spent the last nine years coaching at Dalton High School, where the Catamounts qualified for state eight years and won a region championship.

The former Soddy Daisy High School cheerleading national champion and Middle Tennessee State University cheerleader said she’s ready to get to work at Ringgold.

“It’s been a really good run at Dalton, but I’m excited about Ringgold,” she said. “They have a great tradition there and a great program.”

Fleming, who began as a gymnast, said she never dreamed cheerleading would be a way of life for her. She said she was very blessed.

“I always said I would never be a cheerleader,” she said. “God had other plans because I cheered throughout middle school, high school and went to cheer in college.”

Fleming said she hoped to not only continue building the cheerleading program at Ringgold, but she hoped to encourage athletes to cheer beyond high school.