After suffering a two-win season in ʼ23, the women’s soccer team has brought home wins from nearly half of its conference games this season and is in contention for a top-four finish.
Kicking them into success is Nina Krassner-Cybulski (’25), whose recent streak of nine goals in eight games (including four game-winners) has earned her name a consistent place on the schedule next to that elusive green W.
Krassner-Cybulski, a sociology major and WGS minor, is set to graduate from Willamette’s undergraduate program at the end of this year. Her last year here is also her first year at the MBA program across the street.
“I’ve always been interested in equity issues,” she said. Her studies so far have focused on equity advocacy, sustainable development and community engagement. She also takes this work out of the classroom as a project advisor for Willamette’s CAFES program (Community Action Fund for Equity and Sustainability). “With the MBA,” she said, “I wanted to apply that knowledge … to actually make practical change in areas of interest for me.”
Krassner-Cybulski cited her career as a striker as teaching her to “[take] opportunities to speak up,” particularly in a male-dominated field (she referred to some of her classes across the street as something of a “bro-space”). “I was put in sports and all of a sudden I became a more extroverted person. … That has traveled throughout my life,” she said.
This year, however, is the last in which she’s eligible to play for the women’s soccer team. “It’s going to be odd watching them go through everything and not being a part of it,” she said of the 2025-26 season, in which she’ll have completed her transition from the soccer team to the cohorts of the Atkinson Graduate School.
Krassner-Cybulski said soccer is what gets her through her work and classes. “I get to see my best friends, I get to see my coach, I get to play with them. … That’s what gets me through the day, honestly. I’m going to miss that aspect a lot.”
She’s been playing soccer since the age of four, and some of her biggest growth spurts — personal and athletic — have occurred during her times as a Bearcat. She was one of two Bearcats named Northwest Conference Women's Soccer Student-Athletes of the Week in mid-October. But while it’s her name in lights, it’s all about the team for Nina.
“We would be nowhere without our defensive line,” she said. “But they never get recognized because they don’t score the goals; they don’t have the stats. So when I get something like that, when I win something, when I’m noticed for something … that’s a reflection of my team.”
Even her lifelong soccer career, she said, wouldn’t have been possible without the support of others, especially her family. Speaking of Senior Day, where fourth-years are celebrated for their accomplishments, she said, “My parents are the ones who should be … celebrated, not me. … I would not be here without everything they’ve done for me.”
“You have so few opportunities to be great,” Krassner-Cybulski said of the forward/striker position, “So you really have to take those and run with them, literally.” It’s clear she’s in the right position — both on the soccer field and the leafy sidewalks of AGSM.
The ‘Cats host Pacific Nov. 6 and face Linfield away Nov. 9.
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