NORMAL, Ill. - Former Illinois State soccer great Ashley Santos has been nominated for the 2022 NCAA Woman of the Year award by the Missouri Valley Conference. Announced last Friday, the honor is yet another from her distinguished five-year career.
The NCAA Woman of the Year program celebrates academic achievements, athletics excellence, community service and leadership of graduating female college athletes from all three divisions. Santos was one of 151 conference-level nominees from across the NCAA. Her nomination will be forwarded to the NCAA Woman of the Year Selection Committee, which will reveal the top-ten honorees from all three NCAA divisions in October. After the committee further breaks down nominees into three finalists in each division, the NCAA Woman of the Year will be announced in January.
Santos, a native of Falls Church, Va., earned All-MVC First Team honors twice in her career, after being tabbed Honorable Mention twice (2019, 2018) and All-MVC Freshman Team in 2017. Santos broke program records for minutes played (7,421), matches played (90), and matches started (89), anchoring the Redbird backline and defensive midfield in the 2021 season. Santos was named the MVC's Scholar-Athlete of the Year and a CoSIDA Academic All-American in 2021. She was also a two-time MVC Scholar-Athlete First Team honoree.
She also became the program's second recipient of the MVC's prestigious Dr. Charlotte West Scholar-Athlete Award, which honors league student-athletes for academic achievement, athletics excellence and service and leadership.
