Cayden Pili of Dimond High School is the 2024-25 Gatorade Alaska Football Player of the Year. Pili is the second Gatorade Alaska Football Player of the Year to be chosen from Dimond High School.
Celebrating its 40th year, the Gatorade Player of the Year is the top honor in high school sports, celebrating the nation’s best high school athletes for their success on the field, in the classroom and in the community. The award distinguishes Pili as Alaska’s best high school football player, and he joins an impressive group of alumni that spans CEOs, coaches and star athletes such as Emmitt Smith (1986-87, Escambia High School, Fl.), Peyton Manning (1993-94, Isidore Newman School, La.) and DJ Lagway (2023-24, Willis High School, Texas).
The 5-foot-9, 150-pound junior quarterback and defensive back passed for 1,744 yards and 18 touchdowns this past season, leading the Lynx (11-0) to a Division I state championship. The 2024 Alaska Large School Offensive Player of the Year, Pili also rushed for 950 yards and 22 more touchdowns. Defensively, he recorded 41 tackles along with one sack and one interception. He is the younger brother of Alissa Pili, a three-time Alaska Girls Basketball Gatorade Player of the Year who now plays for the WNBA’s Minnesota Lynx.
Related: Dimond finishes No. 1 in High School Football America Alaska Top 5
Pili has volunteered locally building and donating beds for children in need. “He’s a true athlete playingquarterback and he puts you in a bind trying to defend Dimond,” said Kahlil Bolling, head coach of Service High School. “He very rarely goes down on first contact and lives his life on the edge in the scramble drill. He’s awesome for their school community with what they accomplished this season; they have not had a ton of success for quite a while.”
Pili has maintained a 3.29 GPA in the classroom. He will begin his senior year next fall.
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.
Pili joins recent Gatorade Alaska Football Players of the Year Aaron Hampton (2023-24, West Anchorage High School), Jack Nash (2022-23, Colony High School), Kyler Johnson (2021-22, East Anchorage High School) and Jordan Holland (2020-21, East Anchorage High School), 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.
The above is a news release from Gatorade
