On Oct. 25, 2026, Kylie Nadaner stepped onto the Inter.co Stadium pitch for the first time in more than a year.
As she entered as a second-half substitute against Gotham FC, the Orlando Pride defender completed a journey that had taken her from NWSL champion to first-time mother and back to professional soccer.
The last time Nadaner appeared in a match was, oddly enough, also against Gotham back on Aug. 29, 2025. At the time, neither she nor anyone else knew she was pregnant.
Just shy of 14 months later, she returned to the field against that same opponent. This time, her son, Nino, was in the stands.
“A full-circle moment,” Nadaner told Orlando-Pride.com. “So glad I was able to be back out there with the girls. I missed it so much.”
Nadaner entered as a second-half substitute in the Pride's 2-1 loss to Gotham on Oct. 25, the Club's final home match of 2026. It was her first appearance since that August night the year prior. The skies opened up with rain just as she entered the match, a fitting Florida welcome back, but Nadaner barely noticed.
“I was just so focused on, ‘Hey, just play the game, get through these next 10 minutes,’” she said. “It could have been raining, there could have been a tornado, and I probably wouldn’t have even noticed.”
As she stepped onto the pitch, it was a pinch-me moment for the veteran defender. Along with the excitement came some nerves as she prepared to enter the match.
“There’s a lot of anticipation leading up to that moment. As soon as I got the first touch of the game and made that first pass, I was like, ‘Okay, I can breathe now,’” Nadaner said. “I told myself before the game, you’ve done this hundreds and hundreds of times. So just have fun and enjoy it, and that’s exactly what I did.”
It marked the culmination of a journey that kept Nadaner off the field for more than a year. Before motherhood, she was one of the league’s most dependable defenders, a finalist for 2024 Defender of the Year and a key contributor during the Pride’s run to the Club’s first NWSL Championship. She played every minute of Orlando’s playoff campaign that season.
Returning to the field meant starting a new chapter in her career, one she once thought might never be possible.
“It’s been crazy. First off, I feel super incredible to even be in the position that I am because a few years ago I always saw this as a different chapter because it wasn’t a realistic possibility,” Nadaner said. “So shout out to all the mom soccer players who have trailblazed, because the NWSL, the NWSLPA, Orlando Pride, we’re just so incredibly lucky to be able to do both, to be a mom and to play.”
The Club has been in Nadaner’s corner since the very beginning of that journey. She said the Pride knew about her pregnancy before her own parents did, and she credits that support with making everything feel possible.
“I feel a little bit like a guinea pig in the best way possible, because I think this is uncharted territory for a lot of us,” Nadaner said. “It was very player-led. I felt so listened to, so supported.”
She also leaned on a community that understands. NWSL moms have a group chat, a place to trade advice, ask questions and support one another, though Nadaner knows every journey looks different.
“As much as it is picking each other's brain and stuff, at the end of the day, it is such an individualized experience for everyone,” she said. “So it’s nice to just have that community and know that you’re not alone.”
Then there are the "aunties."
Baby Nino, who was born in May, has dozens of them in the Pride locker room, with teammates and staff embracing the newest member of the family from the very beginning.
“Nino is the luckiest baby in the whole world. He has 30 aunties, tias, whatever you want to call them. He is so loved. He was loved before he even got here,” Nadaner said. “Even looking back to the girls who were on the team last year who aren't here with us anymore, he probably has aunties on every team now throughout the league. They're just everything to me. They’ll never know how much the little ‘good job’ or the ‘how are you?’ meant to me. They’ll never know how much I needed it on certain days.”
When Nino was born, teammates showed up with meals, checked in regularly and helped the family settle into its new routine.
At home, Nadaner’s husband, Evin, has been the constant through it all. He travels with the family as the nanny, or, as Nadaner jokingly calls him, the “manny,” and has been by her side throughout her professional career.
“He is my rock,” she said. “He comes on trips with us, and now the three of us get to travel, and they get to be in the stands. I can't even say it was a dream come true, because it's something I never imagined. To have him and Nino walk out onto the field, there’s literally no better feeling in the whole world.”
That feeling hit hardest in Houston on Oct. 18, when Nadaner was named to the Pride’s matchday roster for the first time all season. She didn’t appear in the Club’s 2-1 victory, but walking onto the field before the match with Nino for the first time was a memory she’ll never forget.
“I was getting emotional because I’m just like, ‘Wow, I just can’t wait to tell him about this one day.’ He’s not going to remember it, but we’ll have the pictures,” Nadaner said.
She’ll have something else to share with him, too.
A children’s book that teammate Kerry Abello made for her baby shower, telling the story of Nadaner’s soccer journey, is waiting for the day Nino is old enough to hear it.
“It was the most amazing gift I’ve ever received, I think in my whole life,” she said.
Going through pregnancy and now motherhood has also changed the way Nadaner sees the world and the people closest to her.
“I think moms are superhuman. Not just soccer-playing moms, but moms in general,” she said. “I understand my mom more now. I’ll forever be my mom’s little girl, and I’m like, ‘Mom, I’m 34 years old. I have a child myself now. I’m a grown-up.’ But now I kind of understand. Nino will always be my little boy, and I will do anything to protect him.”
There is another moment she knows she’ll tell him about for years to come: Marta, the greatest player of all time, holding him in her arms.
The Brazilian legend has become one of Nino’s favorite aunties, and she had plenty to say about Nadaner’s return.
“I’ve seen how much she works hard every single training,” Marta said after the Pride’s match against Gotham. “I can’t imagine myself having a baby and then coming back and working so hard to be able to train and play. But she always comes with a big smile. She’s always positive. So for us, it was so special to see her come into the game and then have some minutes.”
For Nadaner, that praise carries extra meaning coming from a teammate she once idolized and has now shared so many special moments with.
“I have to pinch myself every day. The fact that I get to say ‘Bom Dia’ to her every morning is such an honor and a privilege,” she said. “Everybody talks about her on the field, right? She’s the GOAT. That’s undisputed. I don’t think people give her enough credit for how amazing of a human being she is. She treats you as if you are her equal, which she doesn’t have to. I could go on and on about how amazing she is, but she's the best auntie and she is born to be a mom.”
Watching Marta interact with Nino, playing with him and rocking him in her lap, still leaves Nadaner in awe.
“I’m like, ‘You have no idea who’s holding you right now.’ And Evin’s like, ‘Teach him everything. You are touching greatness. Absorb it,’” Nadaner joked. “If you told little Kylie that she’d be able to be Marta’s teammate, and then Marta would be holding her child, never in a million years would I ever think that’s possible.”
Even as she worked toward her return, there were moments when she wondered whether her first appearance would come this season or have to wait until 2027.
“Nothing’s ever given, right? So I think there’s always kind of that doubt in the back of your head of, ‘Am I going to be the player that I was before?’” she said. “I think that’s just a natural thing. But I tried as best as I could to push that aside. I appreciate the staff supporting me with that and really pushing me, because I could have said, ‘Oh, let’s do another offseason and get really back to myself,’ but they were like, ‘No, let’s go for it. Let’s push it.’ I just really wanted to prove to myself that I could do it.”
And she did.
In front of the Pride faithful. Against the same team she faced before everything changed. A fitting full-circle moment for the Club’s newest soccer mom.
“I knew I wanted to make a comeback. That was always the plan,” Nadaner said. “I’m just super grateful that I had the support to do it because I wouldn’t have been able to do it without them.”
