Colorado State University Athletics
Senior Profile: Emilie Hesseldal
2/29/2016 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Hesseldal Off The Court
FORT COLLINS, Colo. – Her numbers do not pop off of the page, 3.2 points and 5.9 rebounds per game. To limit senior forward Emilie Hesseldal to her statistical profile, however, is a great disservice to the profound impact that the Aarhus, Denmark native has had on the Colorado State program.
Hesseldal’s journey to Colorado State is not unlike many of her teammates’; unusual. The 6-1 senior was a two-sport athlete growing up in Denmark, playing soccer in the spring and basketball in the winter. A gifted athlete in both sports, Hesseldal was faced with a decision as she grew older about which she would pursue. With her dad and brother both playing basketball, it became a natural decision for Hesseldal to follow in their footsteps and choose that path.
From there things escalated very quickly for the self-proclaimed family-oriented Hesseldal. Colleges in America began looking at her to play for their team, but in her mind, there was no way she was going to move that far away from her family to play in the United States. Hesseldal turned away many colleges during her recruiting period, but later in the summer as everyone began taking off on their own paths, Hesseldal reconsidered her options, and decided to commit to Eckert College, a Division II school in Florida.
After her freshman year at Eckert College, Hesseldal left the school and returned to Denmark.
“I missed my family; I was homesick,” Hesseldal recalls. “Then that next fall, CSU started to recruit me and I made a choice that I wanted to go back and finish my college career. I missed playing college basketball. Being home was nice for the summer, but once the daily life started again with work and everything, it wasn’t what I wanted.”
Hesseldal was so determined to restart her collegiate dream that she did not even elect to go on an official visit to Colorado State. Hesseldal had never been to the campus and knew very little of the school or the program. At that time, the Rams were just in the first year under Head Coach Ryun Williams and hadn’t had a winning season since 2004-05, but Hesseldal says that she had a gut feeling about the program and was just going with her intuition after establishing a good relationship with the coaches and knowing that fellow Denmark native, Gritt Ryder, had signed with the team.
“I knew that I wanted to be part of something new,” Hesseldal said. “I didn’t want to join a team where they were already winning; I wanted to turn a program around and leave my footprint.”
Hesseldal has done just that with her size 9.5 footprint.
Since Hesseldal came to Colorado State, the Rams have won three-straight Mountain West regular season titles and have achieved successes that not even the school’s most illustrious team, led by Becky Hammon and Katie Cronin, can lay their name to.
The senior forward is vocal in practice. She is quick to offer congratulations or a high-five to a teammate for a nice play. She asks a lot of questions during film sessions, making sure that she has her individual and team assignment down for that night. The 3.2 points and 5.9 rebounds don’t garner a lot of attention, but everything else about Hesseldal does.
“We all come to college, and we have all been the ‘Superstar’ whether it be in high school or a previous college team,” Hesseldal said. “Starting off, it was one of the hardest things I’ve ever experienced in my basketball career to change my role on a team. I had always been my team’s leading scorer, rebounder, so I had to find a new basketball player within myself. I’m so thankful for that because it has been such a great experience to lead in other ways than a scorer or rebounder. I don’t pop off the stat sheet at all, but I’m not embarrassed by it. I’m just glad that whatever I can do to help the team out, I’m going to do it.”
Part of that has been playing the last year and a half with effectively one arm. During a road game against BYU, Hesseldal dislocated her elbow and tore her ulnar collateral ligament (UCL). Hesseldal missed just a few games before returning to the court with her left arm wrapped to finish the season.
In the offseason, the Denmark native was faced with a decision to get Tommy John surgery and effectively end her collegiate career, or to continue to fight through the pain and delay surgery. She chose the latter. She chose the team. She chose her friends. She chose the most important season of her life. She chose a record-breaking year.
