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Alumni

Darcy McFarlane goes for the goal

The former Tar Heel soccer star combines passion for sports and talent for marketing at Nike.

Darcy McFarlane posing in blue button up shirt.
UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School alum and former Carolina soccer captain Darcy McFarlane was part of a Nike team that developed the most researched and innovate cleats in company history. (UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School)

Darcy McFarlane ’16 is a force in soccer even when she’s not on the field.

At Nike, McFarlane helped develop and launch the Phantom Luna before the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup. A team of women led the development of the shoes, the most researched and innovative cleats produced in Nike’s history. Just a few months after shoes’ release, the young girls she coaches part time were wearing them.

“When you do global marketing, you don’t always see the tangible outcome of what you’re doing,” says McFarlane. “But to go out to practice at night and see them on the feet of girls —that’s the coolest thing.”

Darcy McFarlane dribbling the ball during a UNC-Syracuse women's soccer game.

McFarlane was a captain on Carolina’s 2016 final four team and later played professionally in Scotland and Sweden. (Carolina Athletics)

Changing the game

It’s just the latest coolest thing for McFarlane.

Just a decade ago, when McFarlane was the captain of the Tar Heel women’s soccer team during its 2016 Final Four run, female athletes were an afterthought for many sports apparel companies.

Now, as TV viewership of women’s sports continues to rise and with the women’s elite sports industry estimated to be worth $1.3 billion, McFarlane is part of a new generation of student-athletes-turned-sports-business professionals changing the game.

Since joining Nike in 2021, she has helped market and develop content for Nike fitness apps, including pioneering workouts tailored toward adaptive athletes, those with mobility restrictions and people with disabilities. She was named the global brand marketing lead for men’s football (soccer) in 2024 and Forbes named her to its 2024 list of the top 30 Under 30 sports professionals.

She was the digital marketing lead for women’s running, including the release of the Pegasus 41 shoe, and led marketing campaigns to grow Nike’s female athlete consumer base while also promoting gender equity in sports.

“The appetite for something like the Phantom Luna, something led by insights from female athletes, is so huge that we’re just scratching the surface of providing the products and storytelling that the world is now ready for,” McFarlane says.

Athlete to marketer

McFarlane’s role at Nike is informed by her success as an athlete, first as a Tar Heel and then professionally as a midfielder for the Celtic Football Club in Glasgow, Scotland, and the Östersunds DFF in Sweden.

But she also honed her marketing skills at Carolina, following in the footsteps of her mother, Marilou McFarlane ’83, creator of the Vivo Girls Sports startup.

Even after tearing her ACL junior year, McFarlane remained committed to both soccer and her studies. She graduated a semester early, landing a product marketing internship at Microsoft, a position she learned about through a UNC Kenan-Flagler alumnus. After playing professional soccer abroad, she joined Microsoft as a marketing manager in 2018 before moving to Nike.

“I pull a lot from that in the work I do now. Along with being on the soccer field, my time at UNC Kenan-Flagler was an incredibly formative experience in my life,” McFarlane says. “It opens doors for you to go deeper into any area you find interesting and then lets you figure out what path you want to take.”

Old soccer photo of a young Darcy McFarlane holding soccer ball and posing with her mother.

McFarlane’s mother, Marilou McFarlane, is also a UNC Kenan-Flagler alum and the creator of the Vivo Girls Sports startup. (Submitted photo)

Unstoppable

She is back on the soccer field as an assistant coach with the elite youth team affiliated with Portland Thorns Football Club, the Thorns FC Academy. She mentors a fellow each summer for Women in Sports Tech, the nonprofit founded by her mother that drives growth opportunities for young women interested in careers in sports and technology.

“There are ways you can inspire people through technology and empower them to be able to do a lot of things better than before,” McFarlane says.

Read more about Darcy McFarlane.