Dallas Cowboys cheerleader Reece Weaver recalls ‘bawling’ watching season 3 of ‘America’s Sweethearts’

Key Points

• Reece Weaver has been a breakout star of Netflix’s America’s Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders since season 1.

• Season 3 debuted earlier this month, revealing Weaver’s decision not to return for the 2026-27 football season.

• “I’d been wrestling with this decision throughout the whole year,” she tells EW.

Just like the fans who watched season 3 of America’s Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, Reece Weaver is still processing her decision not to return to DCC.

“This was an emotional year,” the 24-year-old Netflix star tells Entertainment Weekly. “After watching episode 7, it really hit me. I remember just bawling — not because I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, I regretted anything or regretted this decision.’ It was more [that] I was so grateful at how the editors had encapsulated this whole journey. It was so sweet and they took such sweet care of so many of our stories. It was a little bit of a beginning of this, this is a really big word, but the grieving process of life outside of DCC.”

The latest installment of the docuseries showed Weaver and her husband, Will, discussing her potential exit from the organization despite having two years left in what is considered a typical five-year tenure on the team.

“I’d been wrestling with this decision throughout the whole year,” she says.

Weaver started to feel at peace that she was making “the right decision” in March, two months after the Cowboys football season ended.

“I talk a lot about my faith on the show … I felt like I needed to take a leap of faith.”

“I went into the last game not wanting to dance and feel like it was my last game because that would overtake [my feelings of wanting] everything perfect and trying to make everything precise as possible,” she continues. I just wanted to enjoy it, but, in the back of my head, I did think that this could be my last game. But the beginning of March is when things really started to solidify themselves.”

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Weaver nearly missed the end of the season for an ankle injury, but pushed through.

“I told myself, if I can just get to 70 percent and then push through for the last two games, I’m going to do it and have had a full healthy recovery in this off season. I’m doing much better and excited for hopefully more dancing in the future.”

Weaver has been a standout star since season 1 of America’s Sweethearts debuted on Netflix in 2024, which has come with one million Instagram followers and a lot of attention — on and off the field. She tells EW that she feels the pressure to put the sweet in sweetheart.

“Will and I were grocery shopping one time and we had a very busy week. I was getting really stressed and tired — emotionally, mentally, physically. I had nothing left in my battery. I was just done. I said, ‘Maybe we can just go in and out of the grocery store and no one will [approach us].’ And sure enough, every single aisle that we went down, it was one thing after another,” she recalls. “There [are] times where [you feel that huge] pressure of feeling like you constantly have to be on and show the Reece on TV…. I try to be the most authentic as possible when I’m on the show so that everyone can just see me and not feel like they’re meeting someone else differently in person.”

Another thing Weaver has had to navigate is negative social media chatter, often about her husband who some fans suggest isn’t as supportive as he should be.

“If there’s one thing we’ve learned from these past three years is just how strong our relationship has really gotten just because we’ve been hit with some adversity that we never thought would be possible as a newlywed couple,” she says. “We are open for anything that comes our way and we have a really solid foundation because we’ve built some thick skin.”

The couple recently relocated to Alabama.

“That was one of Will and I’s dreams in college and because that was still a dream of ours, we felt like that was still something that we were being called to do and we’re really excited about it,” she says.

Weaver is also writing a book — “I can’t share too much detail, but I do think that it’s going to be really encouraging for young women,” she tells EW — and hopes to keep performing.

“Dance is not over for me. I hate the word retirement. That’s kind of the terminology that we say in our organization,” she says. “But I would love to continue to dance. If Broadway ever calls, I’m down to answer that phone call.”

Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly