Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders Feature – Part 5

The Girls of Paradise … Ann and Sunni
By Mickey Spagnola
Dallas Cowboys Star Magazine
(by way of DallasCowboysCheerleaders.com)
June 30, 2011

This is the tale of two members of the DCC who grew up about 14 miles from each other. Ann Lux, a first-year veteran, is from Texarkana, Texas. Sunni Cranfill, a two-year vet, is from Hooks, Texas, which you may know better as the home of Billy Sims.

They’ve known each other for like 17 years, but not because they went to school together or anything like that. See, back when Sunni was 13 or 14, she says, she was an assistant dance instructor at a local studio. And one day, there was Ann, all of “four years old in this pink tutu,” Ann says.

That was the start for Ms. Sunni and Ann Catherine.

Sunni Cranfill

Ann Lux

“One of those weird, random connections,” says Sunni, “so for us to be dancing together now makes it kind of a surreal experience.”

Seriously, and not only Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders teammates this past season for the first time, but actually roommates during the 10-day calendar shoot in Mexico. How life turns.

Yes, you can do the math, and this part makes their reuniting even more improbable. Sunni, a former Miss Texas in the Miss America Pageant, is now 31 years old. Ann, a Miss Teen Texas pageant competitor, is 21. Both are highly persistent, their commonality since their ages aren’t.

Sunni actually didn’t make the DCC the first time she tried out. She was selected the second time for training camp, but again didn’t make the final squad. Undaunted, she tried out again for the 2009 team, and at the tryouts, there was the once little Ann Catherine.

“We always kept in touch,” Sunni says, even after she went off to college.

Well, Sunni makes the squad on her third attempt. Ann did not on her first, and come the 2010 tryout, there was Ms. Sunni lending more advice to her former student.

“I think we’re both a firm believer that everything happens for a reason,” Ann says, “and Sunni being a Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader for a year, once again she was there for advice and it was a comforting feeling to know I had somebody I could trust … it was nice to have Sunni there. She could always comfort me in training camp if it was a rough night or I was having some problems. She was always there for me.

“As usual.”