Besides the commonly known fall cheer season where team members cheer at school football games, there is also a winter cheerleading season. The winter season begins at the end of November and ends after states, which is typically the last week of February. The coaches of the New Providence cheer team, for both the winter and fall seasons, are Sydney Marciano and Grace Kinsella.

Overall, winter and fall cheer are two different experiences that provide different levels of skills and opportunities. The winter season is different from fall because instead of primarily cheering for another sport, the focus is on competition. Competition involves going to other schools within the division and performing a routine and opening cheer to introduce your school, which is similar to the half time routine performed during the fall season at football games. 

Competition judges look for key elements within the routine, such as tumbling and stunting skills. Competition is much more strict about performance quality and execution than game performances are, and there are many subdivisions within different competitions. This includes game day routines, which is made up of cheers and stunts, and traditional routines which include a dance routine and cheer. The teams are also divided based on the amount of people, and there is a small and large division. 

In order to achieve these higher skills more difficult stunts and tumbling that will improve the potential score of the routine, NPHS holds multiple practices at Indigo, which is a gymnastics building, in order to use better equipment and practice skills with spotters. Spotters are there to ensure that the tumbler is safe and provide help with executing the skill. These practices are typically tumbling focused and are dedicated to improving overall skills in order to be in a better position for competition. 

In previous years, there have been two separate competition teams (JV and Varsity), but this year Coach Marciano has something different in mind:  “Instead of two competition teams this year, we will be having one varsity team with two sub-teams.”

One of these teams will be primarily for competition, and will have around 12-13 members. This team will be predominantly led by Coach Marciano. Remaining cheerleaders will be on a team that will primarily cheer for basketball, but these members will also be taught the competition routine in order to be prepared to sub in for any injuries or absences. The team will be taught by Coach Kinsella.

Besides competition, the winter team also cheers for varsity girls and boys basketball. 

The difference between cheering for basketball versus cheering for football is that the cheerleaders sit in the stands instead of standing on the sidelines, and there is no half time routine due to the hardwood floors in the gym. This allows the cheerleaders to focus more on cheers and crowd participation in order to improve the spirit of the crowd. One of these cheers is “Hey you in the stands” where the cheerleaders call on the crowd to follow them and clap their hands, and another cheer is “Clap your hands, Stomp your feet”. Basketball games are also much more frequent than football games, most taking place on either Tuesdays or Thursdays after school.