University of Minnesota Duluth men's hockey player Joey Pierce earned a spot on the 2024-25 College Sports Communicators Academic All-District® Men's At-Large Teams selected by College Sports Communicators, that recognize the nation's top student athletes for their combined performances in competition and in the classroom.

Pierce, a junior from Hermantown, Minn., was also named to the 2024-2025 NCHC Academic All-Conference Team, as well as a NCHC Distinguished Scholar-Athlete.


Academic All-District® honorees were considered for advancement to the CSC Academic All-America® ballot. Student-athletes selected as CSC Academic All-America® finalists advance to the national ballot to be voted on by CSC members. NCAA and NAIA Women's At-Large Academic All-America® First-, second- and third-team honorees will be announced on Tuesday, July 8, 2025. (The Men's At-Large Teams will be announced on Wednesday, July 9.) 

To be nominated, student athletes must fit the following criteria --
Academic standing:

• Student-athletes must be at least a sophomore academically and athletically.
• Nominee must be enrolled at their institution at the time of nomination as either an undergraduate or graduate student. Only the school at which an athlete competed in the current academic year can nominate that player.
• Student-athletes who have graduated from their own institution during the current academic year and are not competing in athletics at another institution at the time of nomination are eligible.
• Transfer student-athletes are immediately eligible. If your transfer student-athletes (undergraduates or graduates) are in their first semester at your institution, you must use their cumulative undergraduate GPA and cumulative graduate GPA (if grad GPA is applicable) from their former institution — which meets the 3.50 cumulative GPA — to be considered for Academic All-District/Academic All-America status. This would be the GPA or GPAs they used when gaining admittance to your institution. If your transfer student-athlete has a GPA at your institution, then you take the COMBINED cumulative GPA (from all institutions) and use that in your nomination process. (You cannot just select their GPA at your institution to date.)

Academic eligibility:

• An undergraduate student-athlete must have at least a 3.50 cumulative grade point average (on a 4.0 scale).
• A graduate student-athlete must have at least a 3.50 cumulative grade point average (on a 4.0 scale) as both an undergraduate and a grad student unless they are in their first semester as a graduate student and don't have an established graduate GPA.
• The cumulative grade point average may not be rounded up to 3.50.
• First-semester transfers: See the information, above, for how to submit their GPA.

MEN'S & WOMEN'S ICE HOCKEY 
Eligible nominees must compete in 90 percent of the institution's games played OR must start in at least 66 percent of the institution's games. For goalies, a student-athlete must have started at least 50 percent of an institutions games.