The main reason I'll remember this player with the icy-mean look is that she underwent so many different phases that at times I thought she was a different player! First I saw her at the '87 Japan Cup, clad in those old "CCCP" uniforms and looking like a cold-blooded robot. Her hair was pulled back revealing her whole forehead. She looked shorter than the other players (which didn't mean anything in a team of trees) and playing opposite setter Irina Parkhomchuk she seemed to me like a dangerous and deceiving backup setter (sometimes she would jumpset and hit the ball with her unnatural left armswing). Like most Soviet players, she never smiled, but I don't know why on her it was more noticeable than on the rest.

Then I saw her in the Seoul final against Peru, wearing those awesomely busy dark blue and white uniforms. But the memories of that disappoiting 5-set loss have been selectively erased in my mind, so I don't recall much of Nikulina or her performance in that match. I do remember, however, that her "evil" stare gave me the shivers, as if warning me and everyone that the Soviets would do ANYTHING possible to come out victorious. And in the end, her glance had the last word in the matter.

At the '90 Goodwill Games in Seattle the Soviets' uniforms had changed to a less ominous blue, in fact, it was almost a dark sky blue with pink and white rectangles. Odd, yes, but they did look a lot better. Ogienko and Parkhomchuk both made the white headband their trademark, and in general the Soviet players looked elegant, made up, even glamorous, as if they had arrived to the tournament via Milan. And they also learned how to smile during a match, which added to their charm. (Soviet charm? An oxymoron for the '90s?) Well... this new look certainly inspired wonders, because some months after winning the Goodwill Games, they beat China 3-1 at home in Beijing for the World Championship title, Lang Ping and all. 

A year after they showed the world that they were the team to beat, another team came back into the scene and quickly stripped them of their glory. Cuba had been absent from many international competitions in the '80s except the World Cups and the 1986 World's in Czechoslovakia, but even though they ended up 4th at the '90 World's, it took them a year or two to adjust and begin winning again. Once they got on a roll, there was no one to stop them, and Nikulina had to live through that transition in the spotlight. Why? Because sometime after being named the MVP of the '90 World's, then-setter Parkhomchuk left the team out of differences with Nikolai Karpol, and the setting duties fell on Nikulina... For better or for worse, she was now in charge of running the team.

Nikulina's first major test came at the '91 Gala Match in Barcelona. The World Champions from the USSR faced an All-Star team composed of the best the world had to offer: Brazilian Ana Moser, Cubans Mireya Luis and Magaly Carvajal, Peruvians Gaby Pérez del Solar and Rosa García, USAmericans Caren Kemner and Endicott, Japanese Kumi Nakada and Motoko Ohbayashi, and China's Li Yueming. The USSR lost both matches at the tie-break, which showed how well Nikulina managed to replace Parkhomchuk.

Not only was it hard for Nikulina to keep the Soviet team with a winning offence, but she had to assume this role and improve on it to contain Cuba's rising force. To make matters harder (I'd have to ask Marina herself on this one), she had to withstand the yelling and screaming of coach Karpol whose rants went mostly her way. It was at the '91 World Cup that I remember seeing Nikulina with a different look on her face: whereas a year ago she was basking in glory and makeup, in 1991 she looked tired, nervous, and devoid of colour. Her icy-mean look from Seoul had turned into one of worry and anxiety. But so had the rest of the team; gone were the glamorous hair-dos and the colourful uniforms. Now their faces were bare, their hair looked like straw, and their uniforms were of ghastly combinations of olive-green with yellow and white, or worse yet, black with gray and mustard-yellow. This Karpol-fashion wasn't sitting in well. But then again, I'm sure he could've cared less!

The USSR lost both the '91 World Cup and the Olympic final in Barcelona to Cuba. Even though they won the silver, Nikulina was under a lot of pressure but she performed well. Nikulina stayed with the team until 1996, giving her setting duties to a beautiful Tatyana Grachova at the '94 World Championships in Brazil, but staying on as opposite hitter, where Russia came in third place. Whether she was thankful or not that someone else was setting and subject to Karpol's rage, I don't know. But she never quite regained her cold and calculating look of her earlier career. She retained her worried look, even whilst being part of a Russian team that maintained its high level throughout the 1990s. I don't know if she received many honours throughout her successful career, but she certainly deserved more recognition than she actually got. I will always remember her as a player who underwent many changes—in her country, in the evolution of the sport, and in the generational aspect of her teammates—but Nikulina was one who stuck by it through the whole process. That in itself earned me her respect, which is why at the '94 Goodwill Games in Saint Petersburg I was so pleased to briefly chat with her and get her autograph. I honestly hope that whichever "look" she has nowadays, it is a happier one.