UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – Penn State women’s soccer head coach Erica Dambach announced the season schedule for the program’s 32nd varsity campaign on Wednesday, with the Nittany Lions slated to participate in 18 regular season matches with 10 opportunities on the Blue & White’s home pitch at Jeffrey Field in 2025.
“I am thrilled to announce our 2025 schedule,” Dambach said. “Coming off another historic run in the NCAA Tournament to the Elite Eight a year ago, our team returns several key pieces that will look to continue our climb up the mountaintop this season. As always, our season schedule features a variety of challenges geared towards preparing us for postseason competition. Our staff has done an excellent job crafting a schedule that will test us while providing our student-athletes multiple opportunities for growth. Our returners know that the expectation has not changed, and our new arrivals are excited to take part in our program’s tradition of excellence. I am so excited to get back to work and join our amazing Penn State fan base at Jeffrey Field in 2025.”
Penn State will once again take on one of the most challenging schedules in women’s college soccer in 2025, with 10 fixtures scheduled against teams that reached the NCAA Division I Women’s Soccer Tournament a year ago. Headlining the list of opponents is Women’s College Cup participant Duke, which is fresh off one of the most consequential seasons in program history after reaching women’s soccer’s proverbial Final Four for the first time since 2017 last year. Six of PSU’s seven non-conference challengers made the NCAA’s field of 64 last year, with the lone exception of Liberty being excluded from the national postseason despite logging a 15-2-4 finish in 2024. Of PSU’s 11 Big Ten Conference competitors in 2025, four reached the NCAA Tournament with Ohio State and Wisconsin both headlining PSU’s list of foes with each side reaching the Sweet 16 last year. Additionally, Penn State will play host to the newest Pacific Northwest additions to the Big Ten Conference for the first time as league rivals, with Washington and Oregon set to travel to the Keystone State in early October.
The 32nd varsity season of Penn State women’s soccer kicks off in earnest with one of the nation’s premier non-conference matchups on Thursday night, August 14, as the Blue & White travel to square off against the Duke Blue Devils from Koskinen Stadium in Durham, North Carolina. Following a weeklong hiatus, Penn State returns to the friendly confines of Jeffrey Field for a four-match homestand beginning on Thursday, August 21, with the program’s home-opening test against the Saint Louis Billikens. Home-opening weekend continues on Sunday, August 24, with a border battle against the Big 12 rival West Virginia Mountaineers coming less than 24 hours prior to the start of Penn State’s 2025-26 academic year.
Another pair of pivotal non-conference tests come to Jeffrey Field the following weekend, with the Nittany Lions hosting their third straight home match on Thursday, August 28, against the Santa Clara Broncos. The Blue & White round out their four-match non-conference home stretch on Sunday, August 31, with a test against the James Madison Dukes slated to conclude the non-B1G home slate. Penn State’s final non-conference matchups of the 2025 regular season bring the Blue & White to the state of Virginia, where PSU will test the Virginia Cavaliers from Klöckner Stadium in Charlottesville on Thursday, September 4, before rounding out the non-conference campaign on Sunday, September 7, against the Liberty Flames in Lynchburg at Osborne Stadium.
The 32nd season of women’s soccer in the Big Ten Conference kicks off on Thursday night, September 11, with the Nittany Lions hosting the Maryland Terrapins at Jeffrey Field for the first of three home fixtures in league action. A weeklong hiatus precedes the arrival of the Nebraska Cornhuskers in Happy Valley on Thursday, September 18, with a contest against the Wisconsin Badgers on Sunday, September 21, closing out the three-match conference-opening homestand. The Blue & White gear up for their first road stretch in league play the following weekend, as PSU travels to Illinois to battle the Illinois Fighting Illini on Thursday, September 25, and the Northwestern Wildcats on Sunday, September 28.
Following a six-day break in league action, the Nittany Lions hit the road once again and ring in a new month against the Rutgers Scarlet Knights on Saturday, October 4, in Piscataway, New Jersey. From there, the Blue & White return home and welcome the Washington Huskies and Oregon Ducks to Jeffrey Field for the first time as Big Ten Conference members, with PSU’s clash against the Huskies slated for Thursday, October 9, followed by a Sunday, October 12, battle with the Ducks. Penn State travels to the state of Indiana for the final B1G road weekend of the regular season to test the Purdue Boilermakers on Thursday, October 16, and the Indiana Hoosiers on Sunday, October 19. The Nittany Lions close out the 2025 regular season on Big Ten Conference Decision Sunday, October 26, with PSU slated to host the Ohio State Buckeyes in Happy Valley.
Postseason competition opens on Thursday, October 30 with opening-round matches of the 2025 Big Ten Tournament. The league’s postseason event will run through the Championship Match on Sunday, November 9. Tournament format, as well as venue locations for the 2025 B1G Women’s Soccer semifinals and final, will be announced by the league office when available. The 2025 NCAA Tournament gets rolling with first round matches the weekend of November 14 through 16, followed by second and third round matches the weekend of November 20 through 23. National Quarterfinal matches will be contested the weekend of November 28 through 30. Every match in the opening four rounds of the 2024 NCAA Women’s Soccer Tournament will be contested on campus sites. The Women’s College Cup will be contested at CPKC Stadium in Kansas City, Missouri, home to the National Women’s Soccer League’s Kansas City Current, the first purpose-built professional women’s soccer venue in the world. National Semifinal matches will take place on Friday, December 5, followed by the National Championship match on Monday, December 8.
A year ago, the Nittany Lions advanced to the National Quarterfinals for the second year in a row, extended the nation’s longest streak of consecutive Sweet 16 appearances to eight-straight, secured the program’s 30th consecutive NCAA Tournament bid and booked the program’s 31st consecutive season with at least 10 victories, the second-longest stretch of that nature in women’s college soccer. The Blue & White return six starters from last year’s Elite Eight run, including goalkeeper Mackenzie Gress, defenders Kayleigh Herr and Bella Ayscue, midfielder Molly Martin, and forwards Kaitlyn MacBean and Amelia White. MacBean, a native of Excelsior, Minnesota, is PSU’s lone returning United Soccer Coaches All-American, coming off the most prolific scoring season by a Nittany Lion in over a decade following a 34-point season comprised of 16 goals and two assists. Penn State additionally boasts the nation’s sixth-ranked recruiting class and strongest signing group in the Big Ten Conference per TopDrawerSoccer, while landing a pair of extra additions in UCLA transfer forward Taylor Cheatham and German midfielder Sophia Weixler.
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Visit GoPSUSports.com for more information on Penn State women’s soccer. Fans can keep up to date with the Nittany Lion women’s soccer team on X and Instagram @PennStateWSOC, in addition to the team’s Facebook page at /PSUWomensSoccer.