PIERRE — Emery Larson is headed to Brookings.

The Pierre senior announced her commitment to continue her athletic career at South Dakota State University last weekend via Instagram, where she will participate on both track and cross-country teams for the Jacks.

Larson says it came down to SDSU and Augustana University, but only stuck with the first school to reach out to her this time last year.

“I was in touch with SDSU ever since my junior year,” Larson said. “That was when I visited SDSU, last year in the fall. Everything kind of settled down for me for a while and then just a couple weeks ago, I went and visited Augie which was a really great experience so it made it really difficult on me.”

Larson, who will be majoring in sports nutrition and dietetics, will be staying in-state for her collegiate athletic career, but that wasn’t always the initial plan, until a change of heart during her recruiting process.

“They have my direct degree and they’re the only place in the state that has my degree,” Larson said. “For the longest time I thought I wanted to go out-of-state and wanted to just do my own thing. I was like ‘Oh, everybody goes to SDSU. I just want to do my own thing.’ and it just came to, when I went on that visit, I don’t think it gets better than this.”

Another important aspect in her future is the proximity to home in Pierre, which is just over three hours from the SDSU campus.

“They had my degree, I was in a decent driving range back home in Pierre to my family which is really important to me because I am a homebody, too,” said Larson.

The SDSU cross-country and track teams have also had plenty of recent success, adding a little more fuel to Larson’s final decision in her future.

“Alex (Munterfering) and the team are great. They’re super competitive at the DI level,” Larson said. “Just about as great as it comes and it’s only a few hours away so I didn’t want to let that opportunity go past me.”

Larson, who’s involved in cross-country, track and basketball, says now that she’s announced her decision, some pressure has been taken off and can focus on her last year as a Pierre Governor.

“I was just really excited to get it out of the way to just enjoy the rest of my senior year and really focus on this last half of cross country as well,” Larson said.

Larson transferred to Pierre before her junior year from Chester where she won back-to-back cross-country individual titles with the Flyers in her freshman and sophomore season, but says it’s been a big transition going from Class B to going against Class AA competition.

“It definitely has been a very big transition,” Larson said. “Everyone is getting better. Running has really gotten so much faster. When you see that, you see the competition rising, and it just makes you keep yourself in check. I need to get better and keep doing my thing to be the best that I can and be the most successful to stay up where I need to be and where I want to be.”

And now that her future is set in stone, the senior is ready to go out and enjoy her final high school year.

“This last year as I’ve been in Class AA, it’s really shown me a lot and taught me a lot, it’s an ongoing journey,” Larson said. “To just finish as I can, specifically at ESD and state, those are the two biggest meets you look forward to, and to just have fun with my team. I think when I run more loose and have more fun with it, I’m more successful.Putting pressure on myself but also not too much. And just running for the glory of God and just having fun with it.”