Emillie Martinez is the only girl starter and center for Hoover’s varsity football team. She is currently a junior with a 3.0 GPA and is working to improve her academics because she wasn’t performing as well as she had hoped. She didn’t have too much trouble managing football and school. She prefers to complete her schoolwork in between her classes and take care of her practices after school. She enjoys listening to music, particularly rap and Spanish music. She aspires to become a detective in the future and was motivated by series like Criminal Minds and Law and Order.  She began to play football in the beginning of her freshman year. She was inspired to play football because she wanted to challenge herself as an athlete. There was an opportunity for her to play, so she took upon that chance.

The challenges she faced as one of the only girls on the football team is when people judged her as weak and fragile because when she moved up to varsity, guys were stronger and faster than her. Due to that, she had to work harder for her spot as center to be the only girl in varsity.  She had to work herself more and put more time into practices. On the team, she doesn’t believe that she gets treated differently by the coaches or her teammates but she thinks she gets treated with more respect, and she thinks she has earned more respect as a girl.  She enjoys playing football, she hadn’t thought about playing it after high school. However, if she receives an opportunity to play after high school, then she will continue to play.