NKU women’s basketball guard Karina Bystry plans to enter the transfer portal, according to a post on Talia Goodman’s Instagram.
Bystry came to Highland Heights as a freshman from McMinn Central High School, where she was a Class 2A Miss Basketball winner in Tennessee.
While at McMinn Central, she tallied 2,688 points over her high school career, becoming the all-time leading scorer. In her Senior year, she averaged 26.8 points, 6.9 rebounds, 3.0 steals and 2.2 assists per game. She made 103 total three-pointers in that year, helping her team win 34 games with only two losses.
In her short time as a Norse, she made a statement. Right away, she was a high-usage player in Jeff Hans’ offense. In her fourth game at the Division I level, she played against a Big East school, Butler University, showing out big. She finished the game with 15 points and four rebounds.
By the end of the season, she averaged 15.0 points, 4.2 rebounds, 1.4 assists and 1.3 steals per game. She finished her freshman year with 465 total points, ranking as the sixth-most by any Norse since the team joined Division I in 2012.
Bystry also made 143 free throws, the most in a single season by any Northern Kentucky player in its DI era. She ranked fourth in the league in scoring, second in made free throws, fifth in free throw percentage and top-20 in steals and threes per game.
The Tennessee native was a pure scorer for the Norse. In a career night against Purdue Fort Wayne, she had a career-high of 35 points, shooting 52% from the field and 44% from three. She also added five rebounds, three assists, and two steals.
Bystry was named to the All-Freshman team with teammate Maddie Moody and earned All-League Second Team honors in the Horizon League.
Whichever team picks her up in the portal will get a young five-foot-nine guard, who is a pure scorer from all over the court and a high-IQ player on both ends of the floor, who can hold her own on the defensive end.
She leaves Northern Kentucky after one of the best freshman campaigns in NKU program history. She enters the portal as an 18-year-old standout freshman.