INDIANAPOLIS -- Following her graduation from Academy of Art University this past year, one highly decorated Urban Knight has been nominated for the 2023 NCAA Woman of the Year award. This year, Yun "Nicole" Shiau of women's tennis serves as ART U's nominee for one of the most prestigious annual honors the NCAA has to offer.

Now in its 33rd installment, the Woman of the Year award honors graduating female college athletes who have exhausted their eligibility and distinguished themselves throughout their collegiate careers in academics, athletics, service, and leadership. Previous Academy of Art nominees include softball student-athletes Lauryn Henderson (2022), Brenna Youngquist (2019), Haily MacDonald (2016) and Elyse Cordova (2015), women's golfers Anahi Servin (2022), Sterling Hawkins (2019), Andrea Nieto (a top finalist in 2014), and Crystal Superal (2013), basketball/track & field standout Jasmin Guinn (2017), track & field student-athlete Camille Jouanno (2021), and tennis student-athletes Mariacristina Andrisani (2021), Alma Thell-Lenntorp & Klara Thell-Lenntorp (2020), Michelle Dandik Zaale (2017), Nina Gajdosikova (2016), and Jenny Johansson (2015). 

Consistently competing in the top singles and doubles positions for ART U over the past three years, Shiau finished her collegiate career with more than 35 victories as an Urban Knight. The native of Taichung, Taiwan was undefeated in a pair of matches in the top singles spot, 7-3 at two, and 8-5 at three en route to a 19-14 singles record overall and an 18-15 doubles record that featured 13 wins in the first position. One of her biggest career highlights on the court was teaming with Sofia Ragona to capture the 2021 ITA West Regional Doubles Championship and going on to represent Academy of Art in the ITA Cup that year. When all was said and done, Shiau ended as a two-time team captain (2022, 2023) with four All-PacWest Team honors including First Team doubles in 2022, Second Team singles twice (2021, 2022), and Third Team doubles in 2021.

Shiau's athletic accomplishments came alongside a stellar 3.98 cumulative grade point average in the School of Communications & Media Technologies. Twice the department's Undergrad Producer of the Year (2022, 2023), she also earned the honor for Best Individual GPA by a female student-athlete in back-to-back years (2022, 2023) and was both the PacWest Women's Tennis Scholar-Athlete of the Year and Urban Knight of the Year in 2022. Shiau added two CSC Academic All-District Team awards (2022, 2023) and concluded her career as a three-time ITA Scholar-Athlete (2021, 2022, 2023) and Academic All-PacWest Team selection (2021, 2022, 2023) all while offering more than 45 community service hours.

"It's still surreal for me to have this opportunity to be the NCAA Woman of the Year nominee representing Academy of Art University," Shiau said. "I loved every second of my student-athlete life at ART U and having the privilege to 'be an artist and be an athlete' at the same time has made this experience the best for me. I feel so honored to represent ART U and end my college chapter the best way I could ask for. I hope my experience and story can inspire all the coming student artist-athletes!"

The NCAA Woman of the Year nominations are now under review by each school's conference office and two individuals will be submitted as the conference nominees to the NCAA. A selection committee then chooses the Top 30 nominees (10 from each division) before narrowing it down to three finalists from each division. The Committee on Women's Athletics selects the winner from the top nine. The 2023 NCAA Woman of the Year winner will be announced, and the top 30 honorees celebrated, this fall.