Journal Photo By Jordan Wald
By Rubin E. Grant
Homewood senior Emma Brooke Levering was aware that she had a chance to be in select company. So, when word came that she had become the third Homewood distance runner to earn multiple Gatorade Alabama Cross Country Player of the Year honors, she reveled in the accomplishment.
Gatorade announced in January that Levering had been chosen the 2024-25 Gatorade Alabama Girls Cross Country Player of the Year. It’s the second straight year she has been so honored, becoming the second girl from Homewood to earn the award twice. Former Homewood runner Lainey Phelps received the award in 2016 and 2019.
On the boys side, former Homewood runner Will Stone was chosen the Gatorade Alabama Cross Country Runner of the Year three times (2016, 2017 and 2018).
“I really wasn’t expecting it, but I felt I had a good chance of winning it,” Levering says. “It’s a great award to have because it shows all of my hard work pays off. I am really grateful to win it twice. We’ve had some other runners from our school win the cross country award more than once, so it’s exciting to be a part of that group of people, being a part of that history.”
This is Gatorade’s 40th year of honoring the nation’s most elite high school athletes, celebrating their success on the field, in the classroom and in the community.
The 5-foot-2 Levering broke the tape at the 2024 AHSAA Class 6A state meet in November with a time of 17:47.0, winning by 28 seconds and leading the Patriots to second place as a team. Levering also finished 22nd at the RunningLane Championships in 17:48.3, the top performance by an Alabama girl.
As the state’s returning Gatorade Player of the Year, Levering won six of her 11 starts last fall, including the Black & Gold Classic in a season-best 17:43.7.
“Emma Brooke Levering’s domination continued as she emerged unbeaten against in-state rivals while posting most of the top times in Alabama this past season,” says Rich Gonzalez of PrepCalTrack. “She impressed the most when faced with her biggest challenges and enjoyed a number of wide victory margins to close out her prep distance career.”
Also a tenor saxophone in the Homewood Patriot marching band, Levering has volunteered locally with Peer Helpers, which promotes drug and alcohol use prevention. She also has donated her time to multiple community service initiatives through her church and through the National Beta Club in addition to working with Best Buddies, mentoring special needs students.
Levering has maintained a weighted 4.28 GPA in the classroom and has signed to run cross country and track at Penn State University in the fall where she plans to study bio-medical engineering. “I love Penn State and the town of State College,” Levering says. “I love all aspects of it, not just the athletics. I told my parents it’s a school I would have liked to go to even if it wasn’t for track.”
The Gatorade Player of the Year program annually recognizes one winner in the District of Columbia and each of the 50 states across 12 different high school sports—football, girls volleyball, boys and girls cross country, boys and girls basketball, boys and girls soccer, baseball, softball, and boys and girls track & field—and awards one National Player of the Year in each sport.
The selection process is administered by the Gatorade Player of the Year Selection Committee, which leverages experts including coaches, scouts, media and others as sources to help evaluate and determine the state winners in each sport.
Levering joins recent Gatorade Alabama Girls Cross Country Players of the Year Reagan Riley (2022-23, Mountain Brook) and Crawford West (2021-22 & 2020-21, Vestavia Hills), among the state’s list of former award winners.
As part of Gatorade’s commitment to breaking down barriers in sport, every player of the year also receives a grant to donate to a social impact partner. To date, the Gatorade Player of the Year program has provided more than $5.6 million in grants to winners across more than 2,000 organizations.
