records for the Warriors, During her first three years at Lycoming, the criminal justice major has been a part of a flourishing era for the women’s soccer team, helping it to its first postseason appearance and regional ranking from the United Soccer Coaches and the NCAA in 2022 followed by its many accomplishments in 2024. A program that had only two 10-win seasons in its first 24 years now has four in its last five. It’s been a long building process for eighth-year head coach Kenny Fern, and it is clearly paying off, thanks to selfless players like Williamson. “Aubrey gives 100 percent and leads the team by example,” Fern said. “She is an exemplary student as well. On the field, what she has done that’s really impressive is that as much as her individual skills have improved, what she is great at is working and communicating with her teammates to make the team better.” Her dedication has paid off, as she became just the fourth player in program history to earn all-region honors after posting six goals and nine assists during the 2024 season, her second straight nine-assist campaign after posting two as a firstyear player in 2022. The assists shouldn’t be a big surprise to anyone who knows Williamson, though. She’s been assisting for even longer than she’s been playing soccer. “My sister, Shannon, just turned 18 in March,” Williamson said. “She was diagnosed with WWOX during my senior year of high school. She was born in 2007, the year the disease was first classified. She is not verbal, but you can tell when she’s mad, happy, annoyed because she shows it on her face.” The lists of surgeries and adversity that Shannon has faced is long: seizures within the first two months of life, an inability to crawl, walk, or talk, an inability to sit upright unassisted, a feeding problem requiring a [She’s been assisting for even longer than she’s been playing soccer. ] G-tube, difficulty breathing, scoliosis, severe cognitive impairment, and other ailments. Though she is 18, her body is the size of a four- to five-year-old. “She is my best friend,” Williamson said. “I am so close with her. I hang out with her and watch her anytime my mom, who is a single parent with four daughters, needs help. I’ve been helping my mom with Shannon ever since I can remember. I had to grow up quicker and be more mature a lot younger.” Williamson’s oldest sister, Emily, played soccer and ran track and field at Elizabethtown College, and her sister, Jessica, a year older than Aubrey, was an all-conference soccer player at Delaware Valley University. “All of us have always been really close, probably because of Shannon,” Williamson said. “Shannon has always been one of my biggest supporters, even if she didn’t really want to come to my games. She’s been to my games since I started playing when I was six — all my club, all my high school games, and some of my college games.” The choice to come to Lycoming College, two and a half hours away, did come with a share of homesickness, but Williamson said her teammates immediately put her at ease once she made it to campus. “It’s definitely nice when you can just walk down the hall and hang out with someone for the night,” she said. “It was a huge help for all of them to help when I was missing Shannon, my mom, and sisters.” Since then, it’s been Williamson who’s been repaying that assist with her own — a school-record 20-and-counting, in fact, as she opens her senior year. “I’m very excited for my senior year,” she said. “Obviously, we made it to the conference finals last year, and we want to get back to that and win this year. We didn’t lose a lot of players on an offense that we’ve been building during my four years here. If we do our job, we’re going to be okay.” 17 www.lycoming.edu
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