A pair of all-conference student-athletes were honored as Lycoming College’s NCAA Woman of the Year nominees – women’s soccer’s Haley Schafer and volleyball’s Ali Koval, a North Penn-Mansfield graduate.

A first-team All-Landmark Conference defender and a Academic All-District Team pick, Schafer was a team captain that helped the Warriors win a school-record 15 games, the first postseason game in school history and make an appearance in a conference championship game for the first time in 2025. Lycoming’s Most Outstanding Female Athlete in 2025 was a key part of defense that pitched school-record 11 shutouts and on top of that, she finished third on the team and sixth in the conference with five assists.

Schafer, who was an honorable mention all-conference pick in 2024, finished her career with three goals and nine assists while helping the team to 32 shutouts in her career and the women’s soccer program’s first two appearances in the postseason in program history. Lycoming’s senior class won a school-record 44 games during her career, going 44-21-12 (.649) in that span.

Schafer earned Lycoming’s Holly Elizabeth Hurlbert Prize Award in Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies. She was inducted into the Chi Alpha Sigma Athletics Honor Society inductee in 2024 and earned College Sports Communicators Academic All-District Team honors in 2024 as well. She was also a three-time member of a conference academic honor roll. She volunteered in the community as a coach with the Williamsport City Lions Soccer Club and also volunteered with the Central Pa. Food Bank and during the Favors Forward Spring Cleanup and served as a seasonal police officer in Ocean City, Md., in 2024.

Koval, the volleyball team’s libero, finished fifth in school history with 1,502 digs and also added 141 assists and 82 aces. She led her conference in digs twice, leading the Landmark Conference in 2024 at 5.05 digs per set and the MAC Freedom in 2021 at 6.15 digs per set, which also ranked fourth in Division III. She also finished second in the Landmark Conference and 11th nationally for digs per set (6.01) in 2023 and she was named the MAC Freedom Defensive Player of the Week three times in 2021, earning honorable mention all-conference honors that year.

Koval earned Lycoming’s SPS-AAPT-ALPhA Undergraduate Award for Outstanding Laboratory Development Recipient, the Physiki Award – given to the graduating senior with the highest departmental GPA, the Q.E.D. Award, given to someone that provided outstanding service to the Lycoming College Astronomy/Physics Department. A three-time member of a conference academic honor roll, she was a three-time member of the CSC Academic All-District Team. She was also a member of the Sigma Pi Sigma Honor Society member for astronomy/physics and Chi Alpha Sigma Honor Society for athletics, which she also served as president. She also worked as a Physics Laboratory Teaching Assistant, a Writing Center Tutor and developed a scientific and technical writing crash course.

The NCAA Woman of the Year program was established in 1991 and honors the academic achievements, athletics excellence, community service and leadership of graduating female college athletes from all three divisions. To be eligible, a nominee must have competed and earned a varsity letter in an NCAA-sponsored sport and must have earned her undergraduate degree by Summer 2025.