Official release provided by Gatorade Player of the Year
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CHICAGO (June 15, 2021) — In its 36th year of honoring the nation’s best high school athletes, Gatorade today announced Layne St. George of Holy Names Academy as its 2020-21 Gatorade Washington Girls Soccer Player of the Year. St. George is the first Gatorade Washington Girls Soccer Player of the Year to be chosen from Holy Names Academy.
The award, which recognizes not only outstanding athletic excellence but also high standards of academic achievement and exemplary character demonstrated on and off the field, distinguishes St. George as Washington’s best high school girls soccer player. Now a finalist for the prestigious Gatorade National Girls Soccer Player of the Year award to be announced in June, St. George joins an elite alumni association of state award-winners in 12 sports, including Alexi Lalas (1987-88, Cranbrook High School, Mich.), Steve Cherundolo (1996-97, Mt. Carmel High School, Calif.), Abby Wambach (1997-98, Our Lady of Mercy School of Young Women, N.Y.), Heather O’Reilly (2001-02 & 2002-03, East Brunswick High School, N.J.), Matt Besler (2004-05, Blue Valley West High School, Kans.), Jack Harrison (2013-14, Berkshire High School, Mass.) and Mallory Pugh (2014-15, Mountain Vista High School, Colo.).
The 5-foot-6 senior defender led the Cougars to a 7-0 record this past season. In her only season of high school soccer because of club soccer commitments, St. George anchored a defense that allowed just three goals in seven games. A member of the U.S. Soccer Under-17 Women’s National team player pool, St. George is ranked as the nation’s No. 65 recruit in the Class of 2021 by TopDrawerSoccer.com.
St. George has volunteered locally as a peer tutor and as a youth soccer coach. “Layne St. George is a truly special player,” said Julianna Sackeyfio, head coach of Holy Names Academy. “She makes big plays when needed, and her consistency at helping us keep the ball and build into the attacking third has been nearly unstoppable.”
St. George has maintained a weighted 4.19 GPA in the classroom. She has signed a National Letter of Intent to play soccer on scholarship at Clemson University this fall.
The Gatorade Player of the Year program annually recognizes one winner in the District of Columbia and each of the 50 states that sanction high school 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 works with top sport-specific experts and a media advisory board of accomplished, veteran prep sports journalists to determine the state winners in each sport.
St. George joins recent Gatorade Washington Girls Soccer Players of the Year Jen Estes (2019-20, Lake Washington High School), Bea Franklin (2018-19, Seattle Preparatory School), Summer Yates (2017-18, Chiawana High School), and Jojo Harber (2016-17, Bellevue High School), among the state’s list of former award winners.
Through Gatorade’s cause marketing platform “Play it Forward,” St. George has the opportunity to award a $1,000 grant to a local or national youth sports organization of their choosing. St. George is also eligible to submit a 30-second video explaining why the organization they chose is deserving of one of twelve $10,000 spotlight grants, which will be announced throughout the year. To date, Gatorade Player of the Year winners’ grants has totaled more than $2.7 million across 1,117 organizations.
Since the program’s inception in 1985, Gatorade Player of the Year award recipients have won hundreds of professional and college championships, and many have also turned into pillars in their communities, becoming coaches, business owners, and educators.
To learn more about the Gatorade Player of the Year program, check out past winners or to nominate student-athletes, visit playeroftheyear.gatorade.com, on Facebook at facebook.com/GatoradePOY or follow us on Twitter at twitter.com/Gatorade.
