After a week of being honored for her efforts on the ice, Emma Soderberg is being honored for her efforts off it, too.

The University of Minnesota Duluth women's hockey graduate goaltender was named the Western Collegiate Hockey Association's Outstanding Student-Athlete of the Year, an award that encompasses all the things that make Soderberg, well Soderberg.  An outstanding academic with a 3.81/4.00 average in Economics, Soderberg graduated Magna Cum Laude with a BBA degree in Organizational Management/HRM Minor with a 3.8 GPA last May. On the Dean's List for all of her semesters, the Jarved, Sweden native is a four-time WCHA Scholar Athlete, as well as a four-time All-WCHA Team member. Twice selected a Division I Krampada All-American Scholar, Soderberg was also honored as the very top student in her major in her first degree program, the Academic Excellence in Organization Management in 2022.

While Soderberg's athletic accomplishments have been well documented this week, they bear repeating. Soderberg currently leads the NCAA with 11 shutouts in just 30 games played, averaging a shutout every 2.72 games she steps on the ice. The netminder ranks third in the NCAA and first in the WCHA with a 1.35 goals against average, and sits fourth in the NCAA and on top of the WCHA with a .938 saves percentage. Twice the league's Goaltender of the Month, Soderberg was a four-time WCHA Goaltender of the Week.

Soderberg has assaulted the program record books this season, taking over the career shutout mark, which she has already pushed to 22 --  the eighth most in WCHA history. With 11 shutouts, Soderberg also took over the single-season shutout mark at UMD that doubles as the seventh-best shutout total by a league goaltender in five seasons. Boasting of season GAA of 1.35, Soderberg currently sits second in program single-season history with the lowest goals against average, and  her .934 career saves percentage not only would rank her second at UMD among goaltenders with 1,000 or more saves, but eighth in the entire history of WCHA.

A 2022 Winter Olympian for Sweden, Soderberg is also a weekly visitor to the Boys and Girls Club to hang out and play with the kids for several hours.

"Emma is the backbone of our team and has been for three years now," said head coach Maura Crowell. "She is an amazing hockey player with all the WCHA, national, and international accolades to back it up. More importantly, she's an incredible example of what it means to be a student athlete. A native of Sweden, English is her second language and she has excelled in her academics ever since arriving in Duluth. She is beloved by her teammates and coaches because she is so driven, intelligent, witty, and caring."

Soderberg is the seventh player in program history to be named a WCHA Outstanding Student-Athlete of the Year, and the first since Catherine Daoust won it in 2017-18. She is the second goaltender, joining two-time selection Riitta Schaublin, who pocketed the honor twice in 2005-06, and 2006-07.

Bulldogs, with Soderberg front and center,  will continue on with their WCHA postseason run this Friday when seventh-ranked UMD faces No. 1 Ohio State University in the opening semifinal game of the WCHA Final Face-Off. The puck will drop in Ridder Arena in Minneapolis, Minn. at 1:00 p.m.

UMD's WCHA Outstanding Student-Athlete of the Year Selections --

2004-05 Caroline Ouellette, F, Sr.
2005-06 Riitta Schaublin, G, Jr.
2006-07 Riitta Schaublin, G, Sr.
2010-11 Jocelyne Larocque, D, Sr. 
2016-17 Lara Stalder, F, Sr.
2017-18 Catherine Daoust, D, Sr. 
2022-23 Emma Soderberg, G, Sr.