Head Coach: Nick Smith (27-11-4, 3rd season)
2024 Record: 14-7-1, 8-3 GPAC (2nd); NAIA National Qualifier (second round)
Key Returners: MF Savanah Andrews; D Avery Black; F Kierstynn Garner; MF Selah Draper; D Hannah Kile; MF Niah Kirchner; D Sadie Mares; MF Sierra McElhannon; MF Kyana Rios; D Triniti Rowe; D Shelby Rugg; MF Elena Ruiz; D Taylor Slaymaker; F Sierra Springer.
Key Losses: GK Angela Banks; MF Mirarosa Gyllenswan; MF Hannah Haas; MF Emily Howard; D Senna McMullen; F Katelyn Smith.
2024 GPAC All-Conference: Kierstynn Garner (First Team); Niah Kirchner (First Team); Taylor Slaymaker (First Team); Savannah Andrews (Second Team); Angela Banks (Second Team); Kyana Rios (Second Team); Hannah Kile (Honorable Mention); Elena Rios (Honorable Mention).
Outlook
Nine of the 11 Bulldogs who graced the starting lineup that Concordia University, Nebraska Women’s Soccer trotted out in the program’s first-ever national tournament win are back in 2025. Roughly nine months after the momentous milestone victory attained in Aquinas, Mich., the Bulldogs returned to the practice turf hungry for something more. Expected to compete for the GPAC regular season crown this fall, Concordia fields a team it believes is even deeper and stronger than the ’24 edition. The stout nonconference slate is reflective of a team confident it is on the brink of something special.
Head Coach Nick Smith enters his third season at the helm of the program. Not only does he return three First Team All-GPAC standouts, but he has also fortified the roster with talented transfers and freshmen that will push the upperclassmen for minutes. The bar has been raised following last season’s 14-7-1 overall mark.
“The senior group is going to be a class that will be one of the best that has ever come through Concordia women’s soccer,” Smith said. “One of the main things they haven’t done is win the GPAC. Relying on some of the experience that we’ve had the last couple of years, and some of the success we’ve had the last couple of years, now it’s about pushing on and trying to take that final step. Two second-place finishes (2023 and 2024) is great, but you’re still finishing in second place. We’re here to be competitive and we’re here to win things. The second-place finishes are a good step for where the program is headed, but everyone in that locker room is aware of what our goals are. Right now, everyone is working to bring some of those goals to fruition.”
The 11 seniors – and super senior Taylor Slaymaker – have checked plenty of boxes over the past four years. The achievements include the aforementioned national tournament win and two second-place GPAC regular season finishes, in addition to a GPAC tournament runner-up claim in 2024. There have been four recent GPAC championships won by the program, and now the current players want a taste of that glory. At least according to league coaches, Hastings and Concordia will be the league’s top two teams as the season gets underway.
At every area of the field, the Bulldogs are teeming with experienced players who know what it takes to win. At the top of every opponent’s scouting report will be senior striker Kierstynn Garner, owner of 49 career goals and the school record for career game-winning goals. As important as any player on the field, senior Niah Kirchner sets the tone in the middle of the park. Along the back line, Slaymaker serves as an anchor in what will be her fifth season inside the program (redshirted with an injury as a sophomore).
How would Garner describe this ’25 squad? “Dangerous,” she says. “I think we’ll be very dangerous. We are getting better in every single area of the field, and we added players who will be playing in every single area of the field. With everybody coming back from last year, plus more, it makes our team deeper.”
The depth begins with 12 returners who saw action in at least 18 of 22 games last season. The holdovers accounted for 44 of the team’s 52 goals scored in 2024. Twenty-two of those goals were produced by Garner, who is on track to put herself in the conversation with the most accomplished individual players in the history of a program that dates back to 1996. With a season similar to the one she enjoyed as a junior (including 13 assists), Garner would rise to No. 2 on the school’s all-time goals scored list, behind only Jennifer Davis.
The Kearney, Neb., native Garner aspires to earn GPAC Offensive Player of the Year honors this fall. It’s a lofty goal she knows she can’t achieve without the help of her teammates. From an offensive perspective, Garner will be flanked by three others who tallied at least three goals last season: Savannah Andrews (eight in 2024; 25 career), Kyana Rios (four) and Sierra Springer (three). Up top, Garner could also have some new running mates such as freshmen Abby Haynes and Gaudalupe Sanchez.
In addition to aforementioned seniors in Andrews, Garner, Kirchner and Springer, the class of fourth-year players features Augustine Abshagen, Abigail Allen, Selah Draper, Hannah Kile, Elena Ruiz and Ashlee Trujillo. Collectively, they bring a wealth of experience to a battle-tested roster. A Lincoln native, Kile emerged with First Team All-GPAC honors in 2023 while Ruiz was the lone Bulldog in 2024 to start all 22 games.
Said Smith, “It’s great to have a spine of players that are really experienced and a spine of players that I think want to embrace leadership roles that allow us to be really good in games. It allows us to have players on the field who can work through problems. In every game, there are going to be breakdowns. In every game, there is going to be something that goes wrong. It’s great to have and to be able to rely on a group of players that has seen everything before and has gone through tough times before.”
Smith feels comfortable with the play Concordia will get from Kirchner, Rios and Ruiz in the middle. All of whom are unsung heroes that play instrumental roles in controlling possession from game-to-game. In Smith’s mind, Kirchner is ranks right up there with the top players in the GPAC. Along the back line, Slaymaker and sophomore Triniti Rowe are rock solid and are joined by the likes of Kile and Sadie Mares. Coming off injury, Rugg hopes to regain a key role after she started all 20 games in 2023. One of the team’s two new transfers, Joey Long will also push for playing time as a defender.
Other returners who have logged significant minutes in previous years are sophomores Avery Black and Sierra McElhannon and seniors Selah Draper and Ashlee Trujillo. As just a freshman in 2024, Black started 12 games and played in all 22 matches.
At goalkeeper, the Bulldogs will replace Angela Banks, who improved mightily throughout her senior season. Expectations are high for Aaliyah Matthews, who transferred in at semester this past academic year after previously playing at NCAA Division II Augustana University (S.D.). At 5-foot-11, Matthews brings superior height and athleticism to the position. The goalkeeper group also includes junior Grady Smith, sophomore Aliya Vidro and freshman Alicia Lopez.
The talent across the board means Smith will have some challenges in settling on a starting 11 and on how to use the reserves. The roster depth has been a theme this preseason. It means none of the veterans can rest on their laurels and assume a starting spot.
Says Garner of the depth of experienced Bulldogs, “It helps us a lot because people know what the standard is. They know what it takes to get to that point. We all have experienced it so we know what we need to do to get there. We also have a lot of incoming players helping us at every single position.”
Added Smith, who also made mention of freshmen such as Evie Keller, Charli Preister and Makenna West, “We have some players who are new to us this fall that have come in and hit the ground running. It’s even caused some of the returners to feel like my spot is being threatened right now, which is great. I want to have that internal competition. I think the freshman class is going to be five or six strong in terms of impactful players who get minutes on the field.”
In a reflection of the confidence Smith has in his ’25 team, he beefed up the nonconference schedule. The Bulldogs are set to open with two opponents that finished last season ranked in the NAIA top 25: No. 24 University of Science and Arts (Okla.) and No. 3 Columbia College (Mo.). Those August tussles provide a chance for Concordia to put itself on the national radar early in the fall.
“That’s the level we aspire to be at, so I think the only way you get to that point is by consistently testing yourself at that level,” Smith said. “It’s possible to go and get six or seven games that could be relatively easy in our non-con and boost our win total, but at the end of the day, when we’re talking about being in the middle of November or into December, the prep work isn’t there for what you’re ultimately going to be facing. When we’re scheduling a tough non-con, it is forward thinking that we want to get tested early on and see what that level looks like.”
When the season opener arrives on Aug. 21, the Bulldogs will begin a journey they hope leads deep into November (or even December) and carry over momentum from their program record 10-game winning streak in 2024. Concordia still hasn’t lost a regular season game since last September. In an interview over the summer, Slaymaker even joked that her parents were looking at flights to Pensacola, Fla., home to the NAIA Women’s Soccer National Championship final site.
This time of year is the time to dream big. Said Smith, “We have a ton of talent. I think we’re deeper than we’ve been since I’ve been here. The hope is that we can put everything together starting next week when these games come thick and fast. We have to be ready to go and ready to compete.”
View the complete 2025 Concordia Women’s Soccer schedule HERE.