Nardi, who is an entrepreneurship major, was one of 15 men’s players who earned this award for the third time, the maximum as one of the requirements to win the honor is to have completed at least a year at their present institution.

The other requirement is maintaining a 3.50 grade-point average for the previous two semesters.

Two other Wildcats were second-time honorees, joining 46 others across the conference — senior Ben Newhouse, who is actually a graduate student with a mathematics focus, and junior Ty Readman, a financial management major.

NMU’s five first-time honorees are sophomores Andre Ghantous, John Roberts and Tanner Vescio; and juniors Vincent de Mey and Nolan Kent.

Ben Newhoused

In all, the 10 WCHA men’s hockey institutions — including Alaska-Anchorage and Alaska-Fairbanks even though they suspended hockey operations this season — had 105 student-athletes honored, 13 more than a year ago.

“On behalf of the Western Collegiate Hockey Association, I want extend congratulations to our 2020-21 WCHA Scholar-Athlete Award winners,” said Bill Robertson, who is the league’s president and men’s commissioner. “I’m excited to recognize publicly the academic excellence of our 105 student-athletes who have performed at an elite level in the classroom while competing at the top level of collegiate hockey. All of our recipients are exceptional representatives of the WCHA.”

The award is in its 16th year after it was developed through member institution faculty athletics representatives and approved by the conference membership for the 2005-06 season. More than 1,200 honors have been handed out at every men’s and women’s member institution.

Information compiled by Journal Sports Editor Steve Brownlee. His email address is sbrownlee@miningjournal.net.

Ty Readman