Staff

Owners

Jennifer Long

Jennifer is one of the Co-Owners of CheerForce San Diego. She started coaching cheerleading in 1996 and opened up her own all-star gym in 2005. She currently coaches at Granite Hills High School and has been there since 2000, and has been the Head Coach for San Diego State University cheerleading since 2001. She currently serves on the UCA college cheerleading rules board, and is the CIF San Diego section representative. Jen has won numerous National titles with her teams. She has coached teams who have become NCA, UCA, and USA College National Champions, NDA and USA High School National Champions and CIF Champions, and UCA, USA, NCA and Cheersport All-Star National Champions. She is very proud of all of CheerForce San Diego's Summit Titles as well as Worlds medals including 5 gold, 2 silver and 1 bronze. She was named 2006 Cheerleader Magazine Coach of the Year, and 2019 CIF High School Coach of the Year. In her free time she enjoys watching crime documentaries, and camping with her family where they make a pact to turn off all electronic devices - some of her favorite weeks of the year.

 

Casey Popp

Casey August Popp is a loving father of 2 amazing kids, Coach Stas and Boba Axel. Being able to have them in the gym is very special for this ultra-empathetic human. Respect to all and kindness to any are the most important aspects of their lives. Cheer is, "the ultimate team sport" according to Casey. His love and journey in this sport began in 1990 at Madison High in Clairemont as a team member of the California State Champion Warhawks coached by a very young Ray Jasper. With a not-so-gentle nudge from Ray and his mom, Casey started coaching at Clairemont High right after graduation. Cheering at the nationally ranked Palomar College and starting a 6-year stint as an NCA summer instructor, cheer had invaded his life as cheer does. Shortly after, Champion Outlaws was founded and Casey was on the original coaching staff, along with Coach Ana. This upstart made waves as the West Coast style was made more prominent with Champion's success nationally. The next step was growing West Coast Mavericks. Founded in 1997 by 2 long-time friends, this started his career as a Gym Owner/Operator. Our Gym Manager, Nicole, was an athlete on those original Mavericks teams, and has always been a love of Casey's. Fast forward through many years of all-star, simultaneously coaching high school, and staying true to his motto of "learning about life, respect and responsibility through cheerleading," the years flew by and many young people became better-loving citizens of earth. Befriending Jen back in the early 90's through camps and comps turned out to be one of the most important relationships he cultivated through the years. Jen was always a confidante and peer, and in 2008 their paths merged together and they created CheerForce San Diego. To know Casey is to hear the word LOVE. To quote his dear departed mother, "love is all you need." This sport is harder than most, and definitely physically demanding. Casey believes if you give love and respect to it, you will receive it back tenfold. His greatest career stat is to have created a second home, a safe place, a loving friend, and a needed escape from the grind of life for his athletes and their parents. The single biggest honor he has received in his career was officiating the wedding of 2 beautiful long-time athletes. 32 years in San Diego's eclectic cheer scene has been a dream, and Casey has plenty more mini miracles to help make happen in the dream factory for the next 32 years.

 

Gym Director

Nicole Goodrich

Nicole is the Gym Director at CheerForce and has been with Jen and Casey since day one when it opened. She grew up as a competitive dancer and was recruited to all-star cheerleading by coaches who saw her tumble on stage at a dance competition. After graduating high school, she was asked by those same coaches to join their coaching staff, and has been coaching all-star cheerleading ever since. She proceeded to win multiple National Championships, and World championships as a coach, and had multiple seasons head coaching teams with undefeated seasons. As the Director, she is proud of all the success CheerForce has had with multiple Summit medals and Worlds medals. Nicole has a degree in Mathematics, as well as her Teaching Credential. Nicole was a high school math teacher at Granite Hills High School until 2021, and during that time was awarded Granite Hills Teacher of the Year, and the 2020 Grossmont Union High School District Teacher of the Year. She took her love for numbers and education and is currently a Mortgage Advisor, where she especially enjoys teaching new homeowners about real estate. She LOVES spending time with her family - whether going on annual vacations to Big Bear in the winter and Palm Springs in the summer, or running around to different sporting events with her children Tyce and Brooklyn.

 

Tumbling Director

Branden Hunter

Branden Hunter is a tumbling specialist with 10 years of knowledge, specializing in his attention to detail. His hard work and competitive drive led him to becoming a 2x Cheerleading World Champion with Cheerforce Nfinity, 2x NCA champion, and a San Diego State Cheerleader. Although he loves competing, his true passion is inspiring athletes to reach their true potential. He began his coaching career and found himself as the Tumbling Director at CheerForce San Diego, a VIP at WoodWard West (a prestigious tumbling camp) , a Head Instructor at Jamz Cheer and Dance, and current founder of Back to Back Performance (private tumble camp company). His energy and charisma will leave athletes smiling ear to ear even as they are working hard!

 

Team Coaches

Analisa Price

Analisa has spent 24 years working in Special Education for the Del Mar School District. She has previously been an NCA instructor, and was in the movies, "Bring it On" and "Motocrossed." She coached CheerForce Nfinity from 2008-2021 and helped lead them to become NCA Grand Champions and Worlds bronze medalists in 2014, NCA National Champions and Worlds gold medalists in 2015, and Worlds gold medalists again in 2017,2019, and 2021. Ana has also coached non-Worlds teams who have gone on to be Cheersport champions in 2022, Summit champions in 2014, 2018, and 2022, and Summit bronze medalists in 2017 and 2019. In her free time you can find her with her family. She loves cheering on her sons, Jaxon and Logan, at their sporting events, as well as vacationing with the family to Hawaii!

 

 

Ian Richardson

Ian went to Vista high school where he played football and where his team won the CIF silver medal (still bitter about it). He graduated in 2010 and went on to USD to continue playing football. There he would earn his bachelor's degree in biology, and where he would also realize he didn't love football as much as he loved cheer. He initially got into cheer because his older sisters cheered. He would continue cheering for 12 years, 9 of those years being on Nfintiy. During that time Nfinity would become NCA grand champs in 2014, NCA champ in 2015, and 5x World Champion in 2015, 2017, 2019, 2021 and 2022. Ian has been coaching for 9 years at CheerForce. During that time he has won numerous accolades including 2018 Summit champions, 2019 CheerSport champions, 2x CheerSport champions in 2022, and 2x Summit champions in 2022. In his free time, Ian does freelance videography and you can typically find him with a camera in his hands.

 

Shannen Knight

Shannen has coached at CFSD for 5 years. She loves working with the younger kids and teaching them the basics of the CheerForce way. She has been on Apocolypse IOC4 for two seasons as well as Anarchy IONT6 . She graduated with a BS in Mathematics from Virginia Tech in 2015 and obtained her MBA from San Diego State University in 2017. She currently works for a satellite internet company based in Carlsbad as a Senior Finance Business Systems Analyst. She loves the ability to have a full-time job and also be able to express herself creatively through coaching at CheerForce.

 

Alex de Jong

Alex started coaching cheerleading in 2003 at Granite Hills High School and West Coast Maverick. She joined the CheerForce staff in 2014 when she coached Lady Aztecs. She graduated with a degree in Criminal Justice from San Diego State University, where she also was a member of the cheerleading team for five seasons.  She is currently an assistant cheerleading coach at SDSU, where she started coaching at in 2011.  In addition to coaching, Alex also works full-time as a Director of Operations for WCG Independent Review Board. In her free time, she enjoys spending time with her daughter Aria, and is a huge fan of University of Michigan, as well as San Diego State football and basketball. She also loves taking photos for her freelance photography company, Aria Jean Photography.

 

Mario Glaze

This is Mario’s 13th season as a cheerleader. He started his journey at New York Cheer All-Stars located in Long Island, New York, where he won the 2011 US Finals and was the Level Grand Champion. Mario attended his first Worlds with New York Cheer All Stars in 2015. He came to CheerForce in 2017, and in 2019 won a silver medal at the Cheerleading Worlds with Blackout! Mario attends San Diego State university where he is a Biology and Public Health major. He is beyond excited for this upcoming season and is ready to work for those drivers!

 

Lee Smith

 

Jill Clark

Jill was born and raised in San Diego and now is raising her family in the same place she loves so much! She has 3 kids: Jada 16, Addyson 15, and Tyson 12. They are all involved in the community in various sports programs including club baseball, Pop Warner football, high school basketball, high school dive, high school cheer, and all-star cheerleading - which also happens to be a passion of Jill’s. She has been a Cheer Coach the past 25 years, serving her community and giving back. During her time as a competitive cheer coach, there have been many championships and many titles won. The best parts, however, are the families she has met, the forever friendships she has made, and being a part of the developmental stages of each athlete's life. Making a difference in someone’s life is the biggest reward you can have. Becoming a part of the CheerForce family again is an exciting adventure and something Jill is so proud of. With her competitive nature, warm heart, and passion to help others, she is very excited to be a part of an amazing team, to continue to help people, and to still give back to her community and serve the people she loves.

 

Frannie Winters

Frannie has been cheering for 11 years and joined Cheerforce Blackout last season. Throughout her years in cheer, she has had the opportunity to cheer for many different teams in Utah, Arizona and now, California. While in Arizona she cheered for Arizona State University and won the inaugural D2 Summit in 2017 with Arizona Heat Allstars.  She recently graduated from law school and is working as an education attorney in San Diego. Aside from cheer, she enjoys surfing, reading, and spending time with her cat, Franklin. She is so excited to be coaching at CheerForce and is looking forward to a great season!

 

Nic Tomas

Nic grew up in a military family and lived in Okinawa, Japan for 12 years before moving to San Diego for college. He attended Kadena High School in which he was on the Varsity cheerleading team all four years, and committed to SDSU following high school graduation. Nic recently graduated from San Diego State University with a Bachelors in Psychology and plans to get his Masters in Special Education. During his time at SDSU, he was a part of the SDSU Cheer team for 4 years and is currently in his 4th year as a staff member of the National Cheerleading Association (NCA). Nic competed with The California Allstars - Cali Coed in 2019 and was on Blackout this past season. He also hosted the Far East Cheerleading event for DoDEA high schools located in Iwakuni, Japan in 2020.

 

Paige Abrams

Paige has been cheering at CheerForce for 11 years. She won Summit in 2018 with Frenzy, and came in 5th out of all US teams at the 2022 World Championships with Anarchy. Paige adores this gym and is ecstatic to take the next step into coaching. She explained that what she is looking forward to most is, “Guiding my kiddos to love this sport as much as I do.”

 

Emily Zasueta

 

 

Lexi Gude

 

 

Andrew Price

 

Emily Zasueta

 

Mari Carvalho

Mari has cheered for 12 years. She is currently a member of the SDSU cheerleading program where she also attends school majoring in Kinesiology, Pre-Physical Therapy. After graduating from SDSU she plans on going in the field of physical therapy or sports medicine. This past season she competed with CheerForce Nfinity, becoming a worlds silver medalist. Throughout her years in cheerleading she has become a World Champion, Worlds bronze & siilver medalist, Summit Champion, and 3x NCA Champion. On her free time she loves to listen to music on her record player and relax. She is so excited to put her passion for cheerleading into coaching and start this new journey in this amazing sport.

 

Paola Abarca

 

Riley Hollister