Top 2025 Sports Illustrated swimsuit models as high school athletes: Vote for the best

Early snapshots of what 12 top professional and college athletes accomplished before reaching superstardom

Cameron Brink, a star basketball player at Southridge and Mountainside High school in Beaverton, Ore, won a national championship at Stanford and now is with the Los Angeles Sparks in the WNBA. She is one of 38 models featured in the latest Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue, and considered one of the 12 best high school athletes on the list. / photo by Ben Horton/Sports Illustrated; Graphic by Jesus Baca

The swimsuit issue of Sports Illustrated has been an iconic brand for decades.

Today, we at High School On SI give it a different twist. 

We are presenting the 12 best high school athletes among the 38 models featured in this week’s edition.

The list is based 50% on what they achieved athletically in high school and 50% on what they achieved athletically after. 

• SPORTS ILLUSTRATED ISSUE | Swimsuit models 2025

Take a gander at all their accomplishments and then vote who you think is the best based on that criteria at the bottom of the page. The voting poll will close on Wednesday, May 21, at 8 p.m. (PT)

Toni Briedinger

Sport: Stock car race driver
High school: Mercy (Burlingame, Calif.)
Though she didn’t play organized sports at Mercy, Briedinger raced go-karts while in high school  before moving up to the USAC Western US Asphalt Midge Series at age 15, finishing No. 2 in the series. She won the series two years later — while in high school — and became the winningest female driver in any USAC asphalt division. She’s now in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series. 

Cameron Brink

Cameron Brink, a star basketball player at Southridge and Mountainside High school in Beaverton, Ore, won a national championship at Stanford and now is with the Los Angeles Sparks in the WNBA. / photo by Ben Horton/Sports Illustrated; Graphic by Jesus Baca

Sport: Basketball
High school: Southridge and Mountainside (both Beaverton, Ore.)
A McDonald’s All-American and five-star recruit, Brink averaged 21.3 points and 11.1 rebounds per game at Southridge her junior year, before transferring to Mountainside, where she averaged 19.7 points, 13.2 rebounds, 3.1 assists, 2.5 steals and 2.5 blocks per game. She won an NCAA title at Stanford, and was the second overall pick of the 2024 WNBA draft by the Los Angeles Sparks. She averaged 7.5 points and 5.3 rebounds in 15 games for the Sparks in 2024.  

Jordan Chiles

Jordan Chiles was a gold medalist at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. / Photo by Jordan Chiles/graphic by Jesus Baca

Sport: Gymnastics
High school: Prairie (Vancouver, Wash.)
While in middle school, placed eighth in the all-around at the 2015 U.S. Classic, then in 2017 made her senior gymnastics career, competing in the U.S. National Championships. She placed second in the all-around. Went on to compete at UCLA and then for the USA team in the Tokyo (2020) and Paris (2024) Olympic Games, winning gold and silver medals. 

Eileen Gu

Sport: Freestyle skier
High school: University (San Francisco)
In high school, ran on the cross country and track and field teams and played junior varsity basketball. According to the school’s then-athletic director Jim Ketcham, she fit in those sports when not “modeling or playing the violin.” She once apologized to Ketcham as a sophomore “about missing weekend JV basketball games as she was going to Austria for the World Cup freestyle skiing competition. I told her she was excused.” At 18, became the youngest Olympic champion in freestyle skiing after winning golds in big air and halfpipe, and a silver medal in slopestyle at the 2022 Winter Olympics. One of the the 100 most influential people in the “Pioneers” category by Time magazine, and in 2023, Forbes listed her as the second-highest-earning female athlete in the world. 

Anna Hall

Anna Hall broke multiple school records at Valor Christian High School in Highlands Ranch, Colo. / Photo by Ben Horton/Graphic by Jesus Baca

Sport: Track and field (heptathlete)
High school: Valor Christian (Highlands Ranch, Colo.)
Played lacrosse, field hockey and swam before winning eight state track and field at Valor Christian and set a high school national heptathlon record at the Pan American U20 games in San Jose, Costa Rica, scoring 5,847 points. She won the bronze medal at the 2022 World Championships, and silver medal at the 2023 World Championships and is the only woman to break 6,700 points in the heptathlon and run under 55.0 seconds in the 400-meter hurdles. Won three U.S. national championships and won two NCAA Division 1 titles for the University of Florida. 

Rayniah Jones

Rayniah Jones was a top sprinter and hurdler for Miami Southridge in Florida before starring in college at University of Central Florida. / Photo by Taylor Ballantyne/graphic by Jesus Baca

Sport: Track and field (hurdler)
High school: Miami Southridge (Fla.)
Her senior season (2019) at Miami Southridge she won the FHSAA state 100-meter hurdles in 13.73 seconds, and was second in the 300 hurdles (41.39), after winning the 300 hurdles as a junior. She reached the NCAA 100 hurdle finals all four years, taking third for the University of Central Florida in 2024, in a lifetime best of 12.59 seconds. “She will go down as one of the greatest athletes in UCF history,” Knights head coach Dana Boone told reporters after the race. 

Nelly Korda

Sport: Golf
High school: IMG Academy (Bradenton, Fla.)
While training at IMG Academy, she had entered professional events, making the cut at the 2013 U.S. Women’s Open, one month before her 15th birthday. She won her first professional event, taking the Sioux Falls GreatLIFE Challenge on the Symetra Tour in 2016. She ended ninth on the money list that season, earning her LPGA Tour card in 2017. She’s since won 15 LPGA events, winning two majors, and captured the LPGA Tour Player of the Year in 2024. She also won a gold medal at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. 

Suni Lee

Sport: Gymnastics
High school: South St. Paul (Minn.) Secondary
While being home schooled, she was excelling in her junior gymnastics career, earning a spot on the junior national team in 2017, debuting internationally at the Gymnix International Junior Cup, winning a gold medal. She placed fifth in the all-around in 2018 and won the gold in the uneven bars at the 2018 U.S. Championships. She won the Olympic all-around gold medal in 2020, the same year she won bronze in the uneven bars, and in 2024, she captured bronze in both events at the 2024 Games in Paris. 

Phoenix Dawn Miranda

Sport: Soccer
High school: Aliea (Hawaii)
The 2021 graduate from Aliea, Miranda played four seasons of soccer and was first-team All-Conference. She helped her team win the state championship as a sophomore, all which led to a scholarship to the University of Colorado, where the 5-9 defender contributed to 29 career shutouts, while scoring one goal and adding five assists in 73 career games.

Gabby Thomas

Sports: Track and field (sprinter)
High school: Williston Northampton (Easthampton, Mass.)
Born in Atlanta (Ga.), her family moved to Massachusetts where Thomas played softball and soccer at Williston Northampton before finding the track. Inspired by gold medalist Allyson Felix, she won the state (NEPSTA D2) 100 meters as a freshman (12.43) and the long jump (17-7¼), before dominating the sport her final three years, earning school records in five events. She went on to win 22 Ivy League titles in three years at Harvard, setting records in the 100, 200 and indoor 60 meters. She won an Olympic bronze medal in the 200 in Tokyo (2020) and then won three gold medals at the Paris Games in 2024, in the 200 meters and as part of championship 4x100 and 4x400 relays. 

Alexandra Truwit 

Sport: Swimming
High school: St. Luke’s School (New Canaan, Conn.)
They didn’t have a swim team at St. Luke’s, so she swam on the Chelsea Piers Swim team, where she was a two-time USA Swimming Academic All-American, winning the 1,650-yard freestyle at the Speedo Sectionals. She had high school bests of 1:49.70 (200-yard freestyle), 4:52.07 (500 freestyle), 9:58.87 (1,000 freestyle) and 16:41.87 (1,650 free), all helping her earn a spot on the Yale squad, where she competed four seasons while securing a Bachelor of Science degree. Two days after graduation in 2023 on vacation, she was a victim of a shark attack that led to the partial loss of her left leg. She escaped greater injury by swimming 75 yards to safety. Undaunted, she represented the United States at the 2024 Paralympics in Paris, winning two silver medals in the 400 freestyle and 100 backstroke. 

Hailey Van Lith

Sport: Basketball
High school: Cashmere (Wash.)

Modeling her game after Diana Taurasi and inspired by Sue Bird and Breanna Stewart, the 5-9 guard played four seasons at Cashmere, once recording a quadruple-double with 37 points, 14 steals, 10 rebounds and 10 assists. She averaged 32 points, 8.3 rebounds, 7.3 steals and 5.2 assists as a sophomore, 34.8, 8.3, 5.2, 4.9 as a junior and 32.6, 9.4, 4.2 and 4.8 as a senior earning Gatorade Player of the Year Awards twice and McDonald’s All-American honors as a senior. She was also a decorated softball player, holding scholarship offers as an eighth-grader, but followed her college career to Louisville, LSU and TCU before being selected with the 11th pick of the 2025 WNBA draft last month by the Chicago Sky.

Hailey Van Lith was a four-year superstar at Cashmere High School in Washington before an illustrious college career. She was selected with the 11th pick of the WNBA Draft last month by the Chicago Sky. / Photo by Taylor Ballantyne/Sports Illustrated/Graphic by Jesus Baca

VOTING POLL

The voting poll will close Wednesday, May 21, at 8 p.m. (PT)

More from High School On SI:

feed