Women’s Soccer 2025 Season Preview
8/19/2025
The Brown women’s soccer team enters the 2025 season with several key returners and a group of exciting newcomers.
The Bears hold a record of 58-12-17 over the last five seasons, winning four Ivy League Championships in that span. Brown leads the Ivy League with 16 overall titles in their history.
Brown will open its season on August 22 at the University of New Haven.
Key Returners
In 2024, Brown was 7-5-5, scoring and allowing 1.24 goals per game. They outshot their opponents 199-143 in those games.
Brown returns its top four goal scorers from a season ago, including 15 of the 24 total goals scored. 2024 Ivy League Rookie of the Year Ella Weil will look to build on a strong first collegiate season in which she led the team with five goals.
Starting goalkeeper Bella Schopp returns for her senior season after recording 51 saves and five shutouts in 2024. Schopp has a strong 16-5-7 record in her career.
Midfielder Joy Okonye returns as the lone Ivy League women’s player to be included in TopDrawerSoccer’s Preseason Top 100 List. Okonye ranks 99th in the country after receiving First Team All-Ivy honors in 2024.
Senior Layla Shell returns as a captain in 2025. She’s started every game in her two seasons at Brown, tallying four career goals and two assists.
Senior captain Naya Cardoza returns after an Honorable Mention All-Ivy achievement last season. She scored three goals, including an Ivy League Tournament clinching game-winner against Cornell.
Other notable returners include Kyra Treanor, Nadja Meite, and Ayla Sahin, all of whom started at least 10 games for the Bears in 2024. Sahin earned Second Team All-Ivy honors while appearing in all 17 games. Meite tied Sahin for the team leader in shots (26), while Treanor was named to TopDrawerSoccer’s Top 50 Mid-Season Freshman List. Chesney Robinson was also named to the same list, appearing in 16 of 17 games.
Newcomers
Brown welcomed seven new players to their squad, including five first-years and two transfers.
Rylee Keeley transferred from the University of Pittsburgh, where she scored a goal and contributed two assists last season. Hannah Schapiro is the other transfer, coming from the University of Maryland where she logged over 1,000 minutes in 2024.
First-year Naomi Nnewihe earned Mid-Atlantic Conference (Colonial Division) Offensive Player of the Year in the Women’s Premier Soccer League before arriving at Brown. Additionally, first-year Addison Etter was ranked as the 13th best goalkeeper in the 2025 IMG Academy Top 200.
Ivy League
Brown has hopes of getting back to the top of the Ivy League this year. This will be a third consecutive year with an Ivy League Tournament. The top four teams make it, as the Bears came up just short last year, losing to Princeton in the final.
With a record of 28-2-4 in regular season conference play over the last five years, the Bears are no strangers to conquering Ivy League foes and will look to continue that success.
The Bears were ranked second in the 2025 Ivy League preseason poll, picking up six first-place votes. They play their first Ivy League foe (Yale) on September 21.
